


He trusts you

by MoveTowardFocus



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Explicit Language, Feelings Realization, Friends to Lovers, Happy Ending, M/M, Mutual Pining, Nightmares, Sharing a Bed, possible explicit rating, the queen is a dick
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-20
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2020-09-18 20:14:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 42,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20318848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MoveTowardFocus/pseuds/MoveTowardFocus
Summary: Keith's having nightmares about Lance. When the two get sent by themselves to an alien planet on a mission, some feelings come to light. Or, the story of how the Red and Blue paladin find themselves in each other adventuring around an alien planet. Slow burn. Possible explicit rating for later chapters.





	1. Take me to your leader

Keith can’t breathe. Or at least he feels like he can’t with the amount of ash and dust he’s breathing in as he sprints around the laser gunfire being shot at him. He’s trying to keep a lid on his panic but it’s hard when neon bullets of light are whipping past his head and he can’t see the rest of the team. He thinks he left Pidge and Shiro in the hangar but it’s been too long since he’s laid eyes on them.

Something explodes off to his left and it throws him off balance, knocking him to his knees and sending a hot rush of air at him. A little closer and he would have been burnt to a crisp. Broken branches and remains of trees lay scattered around him. He ignores the ache in his lungs and gets to his feet, the dirt from the planet’s forest floor sticking to the sweat on his face.

He can hear the Galra approaching from somewhere behind him, too close for comfort. He wills himself to just keep moving. They need to form Voltron. They have to. He still can’t find any of his friends and the thought of Hunk and Lance laying somewhere bloody and disturbingly still intrudes into his mind.

The panic is rising and he thinks he might cry, if he wasn’t so dehydrated. He’s breathing too quickly and the image of his friends’ lifeless bodies flashes like a beacon everytime he closes his eyes. He thinks he might pass out. He has to stop running. Keith comes to a wobbly stop and hunches over, hands on his knees. Sweat is running into his eyes, making them burn.

_They’re okay, they’re okay, they’re okay_

He repeats it to himself like a mantra, as if he can make it so by repeating it enough times.

“Keith! Where are you?,” Pidge’s far off voice calls from deep within the forest. She sounds scared and oh so young.

“Pidge!” He yells back, sprinting in the direction of her voice. Thin branches and vines whip at his face as he runs, tiny scratches left behind in their wake.

He comes to a stop, listening.

“Pidge! I’m here!” Keith screams back, desperate for any sign of the green paladin.

For a moment, it’s only tense silence. The devestation of the alien planet’s forest can be heard distantly behind him, a reminder that a battle is still being waged. He can’t see a thing, the trees are tall and thick, much bigger than any on earth, and the leaves create a canopy over head that blocks out much of the light.

The awful sound of Lance’s blood curdling scream comes from the same direction he’d heard Pidge’s voice. He doesn’t think, he just runs. He uses the last of his energy and adrenaline sprinting toward the sound of his team mates in danger. He’s suddenly thrust into a clearing covered in debris from Galra warships. There’s smoke billowing into the sky and the remains of the imposing purple and grey machinery lay haphazard in the grass. His eyes dart around, searching for a familiar mop of brown hair. He spots a blue and white helmet amongst the wreckage and he’s there in an instant.

Lance’s still body is leaning against the wreckage. All Keith can do is stand there and stare. He feels like he’s going to be sick.

_No no no no NO NO NO_

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

Keith chokes on a gasp as he flings himself upright in bed. His alarm is still blaring, loud and annoying behind him as he tries to catch his breath. He brings a hand up to his face, covering his eyes. He can still see Lance’s lifeless body, much more real than any dream should have a right to be.

He reaches his hand out to quiet his morning alarm, still unsure on how to work it and finally hits the right button that turns the noise off. He removes the hand from his eyes and is unsurprised to find he’s been crying in his sleep. It happens more often than not lately. His throat hurts and he wonders if he’s been screaming in his sleep too. He hopes not, that would be embarrassing.

He’s been having nightmares most nights for a while now. He doesn’t know how to make them stop and it’s taking a heavy toll on him. He’s exhausted down to his bones. He knows Shiro has nightmares sometimes about his time in captivity. He’s considered going to Shiro before, but the thought of adding any more stress and worry to Shiro’s already long list of things to stress and worry about has put that idea out of his mind.

Keith sighs and stands from his bed. No use in worrying about his dreams while he’s awake.

It’s easier said than done. As he starts his usual morning routine of getting dressed and brushing his teeth, the image of Lance’s dulled eyes keeps making its unwelcome appearance at the forefront of his mind. He’s almost relieved when he bumps into the leading man of his nightmares in the hall.

“Mornin’,” Lance gives him a little wave as he passes by Keith, still obviously mostly asleep despite being dressed and ready for the day. He’s carrying a cup that smells suspiciously like coffee and has the sleeves of his green jacket pulled over his hands, making sweater paws out of it.

Keith doesn’t even give a reply he’s so distracted by the sense of relief that floods him at the sight of Lance being normal and mundane on a weekday morning.

“Okay, good talk.” Lance says drily, giving Keith a look that screams ‘why are you staring at me like a freak’.

“Morning.” Keith mumbles to Lance’s back as he walks away, feeling awkward about his behavior.

Oh well, it’s not like Lance doesn’t already consider him some kind of freak. With a inward shrug and newfound sense of peace, Keith continues on with the rest of his day.

He doesn’t think about his nightmare again until after lunch.

* * *

“I swear to God Pidge, if you don’t give me that back I will sacrifice you to the space gods!” Lance is saying heatedly, almost missing the jump over the coffee table he has to do in order to maintain his pursuit after Pidge.

“Pretty sure that’s not a thing!” Pidge yells over her shoulder, sprinting for the exit Keith is currently occupying.

Keith has seen enough weirdness from these two in his life to know he just needs to get out of the way. He takes a few steps into the room and watches the show unfold, trying to understand what the hell is happening. He had just wanted a moment of peace and relaxation before hitting the training deck. He should have known these two would be in the lounge.

Pidge changes her path from the exit to make a beeline toward Keith. Before he can move, Pidge maneuovers her way behind him as if Keith is going to be willing to act as a human shield against Lance. Lance comes to a stop in front of Keith, trying to peer over his shoulder at Pidge with an angry face that he can’t quite hold, obviously trying not to laugh.

“Pidge, come on man, that’s the only one left! It’s my turn to have the last one!” Lance whines, making grabby hands at the object Pidge is currently crushing by gluing herself to Keith’s back.

Patience quickly running thin, Keith turns around to see what the gremlin has in her hands and heaves a sigh. In her hand, Pidge has what is left of a very sad, very crushed cookie left over from a batch Hunk made the day before. Typical.

He’s saved from having to watch the rest of the circus unfold by Allura’s clear voice over the intercom.

“Paladins, we need you in the control room.” The static cuts out.

Keith can’t help but feel a sense of foreboding. He stomps it down and follows the other Paladins out of the room.

They run into Hunk as they enter the control room, and Keith sees Lance give him a little wave out of the corner of his eye. Shiro looks up from where he’s standing next to Coran and Allura at the sound of the door sliding shut behind them. Nothing seems to be out of order, there’s no ships to be seen out of the main glass window and it’s eerily calm. The only thing that gives away the tension in the room is the way that Coran and Allura are whispering to each other and the tense set of Shiro’s mouth. It’s strangely silent. Keith’s stomach drops.

Allura looks up from her discussion with Coran, as if just now noticing the newcomers in the room. Shiro looks down at his feet when Keith makes eye contact with him. Huh.

“Paladins,” Allura begins, "Thank you for your haste. I suppose the best course of action would be to just come right out and say it.”

Allura looks from Coran to Shiro before heaving a sigh.

“We need to temporarily split up the team.”

Instantly, there are opinions about that.

“What?! That’s a terrible idea! How are we supposed to form Voltron like that?” Pidge gets in before anyone else.

“Yeah, and, I don’t know about you guys but I definitely feel better when we can form a giant robot. Just saying.” Hunk says in agreement.

Silently, Keith agrees.

“Now hold on a minute,” Shiro cuts in calmly in his no nonsense Dad voice, “You haven’t heard us out yet. We know it’s not the ideal situation but we think it’s necessary.”

Not the ideal situation? Keith huffs. They’re new at this. They’ve only split the team up once or twice. Plus, Hunk and Pidge are right. They all have to be together to form Voltron.

_Not to mention everyone was split up in the dream._

He ignores the reminder and tries to get ahold of his patience so he can hear Shiro out. He deserves at least that much.

Shiro starts again when no one looks like they’re going to interrupt. “We just got word that the Galra are planning on attacking these two planets.” Coran pulls up a holographic map with two small spinning planets on it and Shiro directs their focus to it.

“These are the planets of Avira and Adrik. As you can see, they’re pretty close in size and shape but also in distance. We’ve detected a distress call coming from Avira that warns of the Galra’s plans to attack both planets. Now normally this wouldn’t be an issue, but while close together in terms of space, they’re still too far apart for us to form Voltron.”

Shiro pauses, scrubbing a hand over his face.

“We have to split the team up and allocate lions to each planet to defend against the Galra. If we stay together to form Voltron then that means that one planet is left defenseless and vulnerable to the Galra. Sorry guys, there’s no other way around it.”

There’s a moment of quiet while everyone thinks it over. They know Shiro’s right but it still sucks. Keith wishes they had another way. The idea of them all being separated makes him anxious.

“Well how are we going to split up?” Lance pipes up, breaking his uncharacteristic silence on the matter, “I’m not going with Keith.”

Keith rolls his eyes, trying to ignore how much that actually stung.

_Since when do I care whether Lance wants to be on the same team?_

Keith ignores the thought. He also ignores the look Shiro gives him. He must just be feeling antsy from the nightmare.

“You are, actually,” Allura replies, ready to argue it, “You and Keith are going to Avira while Hunk, Pidge, and Shiro are going to Adrik. We leave first thing in the morning, So I recommend going to sleep early tonight.”

For once in his life, Lance just doesn’t say anything.

_Probably doesn’t want to make Allura angry._

After that, everyone slowly trickles out of the control room to go their own separate ways.

“Keith, hold on a minute.” Shiro calls. Keith walks over to where Shiro is Leaning on the main control board. Lance gives him a look as he walks out of the room. Everyone has gone but them and Keith tries not to be intimidated by it.

“Yeah?” Keith starts, unsure of what Shiro wants.

Shiro fumbles for a second, like he doesn’t know how to ask what he wants to ask.

“Are you okay? I…I heard you this morning.” Shiro looks at him with sympathy and understanding, like always.

Keith tries not to look like a deer in the headlights. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m great. I just…had a nightmare last night. It’s fine though.”

Shiro looks at him. Keith knows he knows it’s been going on for a while, can see it in the determined set of his shoulders. He wonders how long Shiro has been debating bringing this up.

“Ok, I thought I’d ask. You can talk to me, always.” Shiro reminds him. And Keith knows that, he really does. Shiro is like a brother to him and would listen to Keith no matter what.

“Or Lance. I’m sure he’d listen.” Shiro drops the bombshell on Keith.

“Uh, what?” Keith asks eloquently.

Now it’s Shiro’s turn to look uncomfortable. “You were screaming his name last night.”

Keith can feel the warmth flooding his cheeks, both from the connotation of the sentence and the reality. Keith was a private person, liked to deal with his pain and struggles by himself most of the time. It was embarrassing as well that it had to be Lance of all people. _Lance._

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Keith says, voice insinuating he wouldn’t be asking Lance to listen to anything any time soon.

Shiro sighs, relenting. “Okay. As long as you’re sure. I think this mission will be good for you guys.” Shiro claps him on the shoulder, “I better go finish going over everything with Allura.” He left Keith standing in the middle of the control room.

That night laying in bed, Keiths stares up at the ceiling, Shiro’s words on repeat in his mind.

_I just think that this mission will be good for you guys._

* * *

As promised, the next day the paladins depart on their separate missions. It’s a somewhat somber affair, with lots of standing around and prolonging the inevitable.

_It’s not like I’ll never see them again. It’s just for this mission._

Voltron is such a large part of who they are now. Nightmares or no nightmares, Keith can’t help but feel wrong about them splitting up like this.

In the end, It’s Lance that makes the first move towards getting in his lion.

“You guys can stand around some more, mourning how you won’t see my face for the entire length of this mission if you want to. I’ll understand.” Lance smirks, climbing into Blue.

“Mourning? I think you meant appreciating.” Pidge says as she gets into her own, because she can’t not.

Hunk just shakes his head and starts getting in his lion after a small wave in Lance and Keith’s direction. “Good luck you guys.”

Then it’s just Shiro and Keith.

“You look like you haven’t slept at all.” Shiro says bluntly, crossing his arms in front of him as he gives Keith a concerned look.

“I could say the same thing to you.” And it’s true. Keith knows Shiro stays up late coming up with battle plans and whatever else with Allura and Coran. It’s a cowardly move, directing the attention back on Shiro but Keith doesn’t have the energy to talk about this again.

“Just remember what I said before. Be careful.” Shiro pulls him in for a brief hug.

“You too.” Keith says, trying to convey how much he means it. He’s always afraid to say goodbye to Shiro, the Kerberos mission too large of a scar.

“Come on Mr. Grumpy Pants, get in your lion, we have a planet to defend!” Lance says over their comm, tiny voice coming from the helmet in Keith’s hand, and he tries not to smile as he does what he’s told.

_What a dork._

It’s a forty five minute flight. It’s spent mostly in silence, for which Keith is grateful. His lack of sleep paired with his worry over the mission means that his patience is even thinner than usual. He pilots the Red Lion silently, the quiet hum of machinery calms him as he watches out the window. He can see the Blue lion off to his right. Lance hasn’t said anything over the comms, which is kind of weird. Lance has a fondness for goading Keith into racing or belting out Shakira just to annoy him. He almost wants to break the silence himself, just to check on Lance. He decides against it, figuring he’ll just appreciate this one moment of peace.

Finally, Avira comes into view and they start the landing process. It’s an incredibly dry planet, and Keith has a horrible moment where he thinks it looks exactly like his little shack in the desert before he dismisses the thought. Never again. Besides, it’s obviously nothing like an Earth desert. For starters, the sand is a very light green color and there are tropical looking trees dotted throughout the landscape. It’s not a very flat planet either, with what looks like mountains in the distance.

As they get closer, Lance breaks his radio silence to comment on the architecture.

“Their houses look like tents.”

Keith thinks that tents isn’t quite right. Their buildings are all varying sizes and shapes, but they have fabric roofing, like tents you would find at a farmers market, so maybe Lance is on to something. They also appear to be stacked on top of one another, with ladders leading to the upper buildings. Keith has no idea how the buildings don’t collapse in on each other when the wind blows, it looks so delicately put together despite being made of stone.

The weird part is that Keith has yet to see anyone who would live in these buildings.

“Do you see anybody?” Keith asks, Red hovering in the air.

“No, let’s land and we’ll see if they break out the parade for us.”

They find a relatively open spot to touch down just a short walking distance away from the buildings. Keith climbs out of his lion and takes his helmet off after his suit tells him there’s enough oxygen to breathe and no toxins in the air. He takes a moment to look around the eerily quiet landscape. It puts him on edge.

“So, no parade then?” Lance asks as he wanders over, stretching.

“Guess not.”

They start walking catiously toward what appears to be the main portion of the little village. Keith has a hand on his bayard, should he need it. Lance rolls his eyes when he sees him.

“Hello? Is anyone there?” Lance calls, peering into windows.

“Be quiet! You don’t know what’s waiting for us.” Keith hisses, coming up to Lance’s side to pull him away from the side of the building. Lance pulls his arm from Keith’s grip but takes a step back.

“Sheesh, I was just trying to see if anyone was actually here or not.” Lance raises the hand not holding his helmet up in surrender.

Keith ignores the little flash of guilt from his overreaction and turns away from Lance to survery the buildings behind them. He sees one that looks to be selling clothing items and shoes, the thin fabric folded neatly on the stand out front.

“Just…be careful. You don’t know if the Avirans are the only ones here or not.” Keith turns back to Lance.

Lance looks at Keith for a moment, tilting his head. It makes Keith uncomfortable, unsure of what Lance is even looking at.

“Okay.”

It’s a simple answer, and Keith doesn’t know what to do with it. He doesn’t get the chance to think about it further. Suddenly, there’s movement as a tall figure with what looks to be too many arms runs across the square. Keith’s relieved when it bares no resemblance to the Galra.

“Wait! We’re the paladins of Voltron. We’re here to help you.” Keith takes a quick step in its direction.

The figure stops and turns to look at them and Keith gets a better look. The figure looks male, with wide shoulders and intricate pastel clothing that only covers from the waist down. Also he, Keith is assuming he, has four arms.

“You are the paladins of Voltron?” The accent is easy on the ears, very smooth.

“Yes, we’re answering your distress call. Can you point me in the direction of your leader?” Keith suddenly has flashes of cheesy alien TV shows where a little green man says ‘Take me to your leader!’.

Lance snorts and Keith thinks he must have had the same thought. He tries not to smile.

The alien seems to be considering them closely. Eventually, he raises one of his four arms and beckons them to follow him. “This way.”

Keith makes eye contact with Lance, who just shrugs and turns to follow.

The alien leads them through the village to a more secluded section of buildings that are much larger than the ones they first saw upon arrival. Now that they’re up close, Keith can see how all of the buildings have glass molded into them. It makes them shine as the light passes through.

“What’s your name?” Lance asks, sliding up next to their guide.

“Rhaegar. What is yours?” The alien, Rhaegar, turns to look at Lance. Well, down at Lance. The Avirans are very tall.

“I’m Lance. That guy with the angry face is Keith. Where is everyone else?” Lance asks, admiring the buildings as they pass.

_I don’t look that angry_, Keith thinks self-consciously. He dismisses the thought. It’s not like he cares what Lance thinks he looks like.

“They are in hiding. We do not know when the Galra will attack and we did not know if Voltron would appear. They will most likely come out now that the brave paladins are here.” Rhaegar says somewhat flirtatiously, Keith notes, inexplicably annoyed.

_Great, just what we need, more aliens to flirt with Lance._

The exhaustion is creeping up on Keith. He has a headache.

“Are we almost to who’s in charge?” Keith breaks in.

Lance shoots him a weird look he can’t decipher.

“Yes, that building there is where our queen resides. She was dearly hoping Voltron would come.”

The rest of the walk into the palace is made in silence. The ‘building’ ends up being more like a castle. It’s much taller than the other buildings and is more brightly colored though still pastel. He wonders how they got the buildings to be colored that way without paint.

Rhaegar leads them into the palace and down a long hall where several other villagers give them appraising looks as they pass. Keith spends the entire walk baffled by the lack of security at the entrance. They just strolled right in. His unease is interrupted by their arrival at the throne room. The large heavy doors are opened by guareds in tight fitted silver armor.

_Two guards._

“My queen, I present the paladins of Voltron.” Rhaegar announces respectfully, bowing low.

Keith and Lance just stand there, unsure of the protocol but earnest none the less.

The queen stands from her throne and makes her way down the few steps toward them. She gives them both long looks. Keith already doesn’t like her. She’s dressed ornately, with a long flowing pink dress that matches the pastel theme of the buildings and the sand. Her hair is piled on her head without strand out of place. She’s frowning, shoulders held high. She smiles slowly.

“My, aren’t you handsome.”

_What is with the aliens on this planet._

Before Keith can interrupt with a comment about how they’re here for a very important mission, Lance is answering in his usual manner.

“Thank you, your highness, but I could not possibly be as attractive as you.”

Keith rolls his eyes. Gag.

The queen turns to Keith and frowns.

“You, not so much.”

“Hey, I don’t—” Lance starts. Keith cuts him off.

“Your highness, we are the paladins of Voltron. We’re here to help.” Keith says drily, the queen’s comment hurting more than he would like. Whatever, they were here to do a job and leave. The queen’s lack of urgency toward their response to the distress call irritates him. They split the team up for this.

The queen resumes a more authoritative air.

“Ah yes. Thank you for coming to our aid, we are very grateful. We do not know when the Galra will attack but we have intel that it could be within the next couple of weeks.”

_Weeks? I’m never making it back to the ship._

“For now, we just ask that you help prepare our people for the coming fight and remain on call for when the day arrives. Until then, we will show you to your room. Rhaegar, if you will.” The queen dismissed them.

_Wait, room? Singular?_

Lance and Keith follow Rhaegar out of the room. Keith’s still trying to wrap his mind around what the queen just said. She did say room, singular, right? That’s bad. Keith has nightmares every night. He can’t share a room with Lance. Especially not when the nightmares are _about _Lance.

Rhaegar leads them down a long hallway, it’s stone walls decorated with various paintings and tapestries that Keith thinks doesn’t quite match the pastel theme. His attempt at distracting himself gets thrown out the window when they arrive at a solid wooden door.

Rhaegar gives a little bow and then walks away, pastel clothing swishing as he goes.

Keith and Lance share a somewhat strained look.

Keith turns the knob on their room, yup, singular, and tries not to have a heart attack.

There’s only one bed.

It’s large and comfortable looking, with incredibly soft white blankets piled on it. It’s hard to miss as it rests against the wall opposite the door.

Keith takes another step into the room so that they’re not just awkwardly hanging out in the hallway. He tries to get a lid on his panic. He definitely cannot share this room with Lance. If he goes to sleep, he will have nightmares. If he has nightmares, he will cry and scream in his sleep and Lance does not need to know anything about that. That is a conversation he does not want to have.

He slowly walks around the bed, examining the other parts of the room as he goes. There’s a dresser against the wall to the left of the bed and small table in the corner with some books stacked on it. Keith comes across another door at the right of the room and opens it. It’s the bathroom, which is much larger than he thought it would be, almost the size of the bedroom and elegantly furnished with different types of soap on a shelf near the tub.

_Lance is going to have a field day with that._

“Hey look at this! This is what I’m talking about.” He hears Lance call from the bedroom. Keith puts down the bottle of soap he was examining and leans against the bathroom doorframe to see what Lance is talking about.

He’s holding an intricate glass decanter with a dark amber liquid inside of it in one hand and two matching glasses in the other.

“Don’t break that. The last thing we need is to have to owe these people a bunch of money.” Keith says in response, folding his arms over his chest.

Lance fakes like he’s going to drop it, the alcohol sloshing in the container, but puts it back on top of the dresser when Keith gives him a look. Keith’s eyes return to the bed. It’s hard not to, it’s so big. That situation can wait until later though. He needs time to come up with a plan.

Keith walks across the room and pulls out one of the chairs at the table and sits down.

“I can’t believe they didn’t have a plan for when we got here. They want us to just remain on call? We could be helping other people right now.” Keith gripes, resting his chin on his hand. The unorganization of helping alien societies is actually pretty common, but Keith needs to think about something other than the bed.

Lance plops down on the bed, splaying out like a starfish with his feet hanging over the side. “They don’t know when they’re going to be attacked. It’s not like they have a whole lot of options.”

Keith knows this, he’s just feeling tense. He guesses that Lance can sense his uneasiness because he stands up and comes to sit with Keith at the table.

“I’m telling you man, we could drink the alcohol. Space alcohol. It could be fun.” Lance pokes him in the ribs.

Keith thinks about all of the things that could go wrong with that scenario, rubbing his side.

“No thanks.”

Lance wilts a little. “You’re no fun.”

Keith shrugs in lack of answer. He isn’t fun, he’s known that for a while now.

There’s a knock at the door that startles them both. Lance slides out of his seat to go answer it, probably eager to get away from Keith’s moodiness. Keith tilts his head to see who it is.

“I have brought clothing.” Rhaegar says in greeting, holding up a small pile of fabric.

Keith supposes that if they’re going to be here for several weeks that they’re going to have to change at some point. Rhaegar hands Lance the folded clothing and Keith gets up to take them from him, setting them on the dresser before joining him back at the door.

“Also," Rhaegar continues, “The queen requests your presence tonight in the grand hall for dinner. Please wear what you have been given. A guard will send for you. That is all.”

They close the door as Rhaegar walks away. Great, dinner with the queen. Just what they need.

Keith goes to investigate the clothing situation. He’s been given enough clothing by alien communities by now to know that there’s an incredibly loose definition for ‘clothing’ in space.

He lifts the top red piece off of the pile to find a matching blue one underneath. At least they’re not stuck wondering whose is whose. He hands Lance his, and starts to unfold his own. He’s relieved to find that there is a shirt component and that he won’t be naked from the waist up like Rhaegar. It’s a simple design with a sleeveless top made out of a nearly sheer material the color of red wine and a neckline that’s probably lower than Keith would like. The pants are a soft grey and look to be fitted in order to work with the loose flow of the top.

_It could be worse._

He looks up from his spot at the dresser to find that Lance has already put his on while Keith was figuring his out. He looks nice. Attractive, even. They’ve dressed Lance somewhat similarly to Keith in terms of material and the pants situation, but the back of Lance’s shirt is only connected at the top and allows the back of his shirt to hang open, revealing the long expanse of his back. It’s a deep royal blue, sheer like Keith’s. Lance hasn’t looked up from the knick knack he’s investigating that he swiped from on top of the table.

“I’m, uh, going to go put this on.” He says lamely, holding his pile up before making the quick walk to the bathroom. He spares another glance at Lance as he passes, who’s giving him a questioning look. He shuts the door behind him with a quiet click.

He feels hot, nervous almost, and he doesn’t know why. He takes a breath and looks at himself in the mirror.

_Get a grip. It’s just another mission._

Keith changes as quick as he can, feeling unlike himself in the foreign clothing. He feels put on display and too dressed up. He misses his jeans and simple black shirt.

When he re-enters the bedroom, Lance has his shoes on again. They don’t really go with his newly gained outfit, but he supposes there’s not a lot to be done about that.

“I’m going to go explore the castle. See if I can talk to some of the locals.” Lance explains, one hand on the doorknob. His gaze flicks over Keith briefly before he looks away again. Keith resists the urge to cross his arms.

“I’m going to call Shiro and update him on the mission.” Keith replies, pulling his own shoes on. It’ll be a little bit of a walk back to his lion, but he could use the fresh air.

Lance shrugs. “Suit yourself.”

Keith ends up leaving right behind him, closing the door on an empty room. Lance turns one way down the hall and Keith the other, shoes loud on the stone floor. He looks over his shoulder once to make sure Lance is still there. He is, shirt billowing behind him as he goes. Satisfied Lance won’t get into trouble, Keith heads for the Red Lion.

It’s satisfying, climbing into his lion. He can feel how she missed him and it makes him feel at home.

“Hey, Red.” He greets quietly, moving to sit in the captain’s chair.

He pulls up the visual on the comms and connects to Shiro. It holds an empty display as it alerts Shiro that someone is trying to join his comm, and it suddenly occurs to Keith that Shiro is probably busy right now. Just when he goes to turn it off, Shiro’s face appears in the display.

“Hey, how’s it going?” Shiro’s warm voice echo’s inside of the cabin.

Keith frowns. “They said we could be here for weeks.”

“Most missions aren’t done in one day.” Shiro reminds him.

Keith swivels back and forth in his chair, propping his feet up on the controls. “I know, it’s still annoying though.”

It’s quiet for a second, the static of the comm system filling the air as Shiro considers him. It makes Keith squirm.

“What?” Keith finally asks, exasperated.

“This is about Lance, isn’t it?” Shiro asks knowingly.

Keith flounders, mouth opening and closing. “What? What, no. No. It’s not about Lance.”

“Mmhm.” Shiro tilts his head at him. Damn him.

“Okay, maybe it’s a little about Lance.” Keith relents, crossing his arms.

Shiro smiles at him. Keith would hate it if he didn’t know Shiro was just trying to listen. Shiro waits quietly while Keith gathers his thoughts.

“We have to share a room.” Keith says in explanation.

“Oh.” Shiro gets it, Keith can hear it in the tone of his voice.

“Yeah.” Keith winces at how disheartened his own voice sounds.

“You could always talk to him about it. The nightmares I mean.” Shiro prompts gently.

Keith knows. They’ve already had this conversation. He’s just trying to prolong the inevitable. He just doesn’t know how Lance will react. Keith knows he won’t be mean about it, Lance isn’t that much of a dick, but Keith hates the thought of making it awkward between them when they’ve only just recently found some even ground. Keith must have been silent for too long because Shiro breaks the silence again.

“Keith, he trusts you,” Shiro’s voice is calm and encouraging, “he does. I think you trust him too. Just try it and see what happens.”

He hates it when Shiro is right. Which is always.

“Fine.” Keith admits defeat.

“So no other news about the Galra?” Shiro asks, changing the topic. Keith is grateful.

He sighs. “No. None. The Avirans have hidden their people in preparation, and they want us to train them for battle. That’s not what we signed up for Shiro, and I don’t know if we can train that many people in such a short amount of time.”

Shiro cocks his head. “It’s a similar situation here. The people seem unprepared for attack despite sending the distress signal. It’s odd. I suppose for now the best we can do is try our best to get them ready.”

Keith nods. They don’t really have any other options.

“Will do. You guys doing okay out there?” Keith asks. He tries to sound uninterested, but he’s been worrying about his teammates since they left. As much as they annoy him, they’re his family.

Shiro must be able to hear it in his voice. “They’re fine. Pidge has been working with the people on their coding skills and Hunk is having a great time raiding the castle kitchen.”

Keith smiles. “I’m glad it’s going okay.”

“Same for you. I’ll talk to you later. Remember what I said about Lance.” Shiro waves goodbye and clicks out of the comm before he can respond, Keith’s display going dark.

He sits awhile longer in his lion, appreciating the quiet and familiarity.

_I think you trust him too._

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, Keith is walking back into their shared room. Lance is there at the table, reading a book. It throws Keith completely for a loop, it’s so unexpected. Lance looks up at the sound of the door closing and puts the book down. He doesn’t say anything.

“I didn’t know you could read.” Keith breaks the awkward moment.

Lance throws the book at him, the soft cover bouncing off Keith’s torso. “Asshole, I can too. Well, not this one. It’s not in English. Or Spanish. I just wanted to see what their language looks like.”

There’s another knock at the door.

_What do I have to do to be left alone?_

Keith turns back around and takes the few steps toward the door, pulling it open despite having just shut it. It’s a castle guard.

_Probably one of the only two I saw._

“Please follow me.” Is all the guard says, stepping to the side to make room for them to exit.

Keith turns and looks at Lance who grins back at him.

“Well, this should be fun.”

The two follow the guard past several rooms and past the entrance they entered the castle by, so Keith guesses they’re heading toward the other end of the building. They stop in front of an open room large enough to hold the long table in the middle, piled high with food. The queen stands from where she is sat at the head of the table and all of the guests rise with her.

“My honored guests, please join me in welcoming these two paladins of Voltron, without whom our planet would stand no chance against the Galra.”

The room erupts into polite applause as Keith and Lance are led to their seats. Keith ends up directly to the queen’s right and Lance to her left. Everyone sits again as the applause dies down and the guests dig into the food.

Keith takes a moment to take in the room. The queen is dressed as elegantly as she was earlier that day. She’s changed into a deep purple evening gown that reaches the floor, what must be diamonds sparkling along the neckline. It’s a beautiful gown, but it seems out of place with the pastel blues and greens the guests are wearing. He supposes that if you’re the queen you can wear whatever you want.

The table itself is impossibly long, ten feet or more, and made from wood. It’s solid and sturdy. The plates and silverware are all silver etched with an intricate flower pattern. There’s several platters with all kinds of food, some he knows and some he doesn’t, piled so high it’s almost off putting. It’s extravagant and a tad wasteful. Keith thinks of his little shack in the desert with his cans of tomato soup and feels a little disgusted.

“I’m sure you must have many stories of your time as members of Voltron. I would be delighted to hear of them.”

Keith’s attention is brought back into focus by the queen’s request. She’s leaning forward in her seat, eyes on Lance.

“Uh, yeah. For sure,” Lance’s eyes flick between the queen and Keith, “one time I met some mermaids. That was pretty cool.”

For all the time Lance spends flirting, Keith thinks he seems pretty uncomfortable with the current situation. It’s unlike him and Keith starts to wonder if he’s feeling okay.

“Keith has some good stories too.” Lance adds on.

Keith eyes move from the queen to Lance, looking at him in question. Since when does Lance think any of his stories are interesting? Keith looks back at him with his own questioning look. Lance kicks him underneath the table.

“I almost got killed one time by our own ship. One of the training robots went rogue.” Keith pulls something off of the top of his head. It certainly was a memorable experience. He tilts his head at Lance in question. Lance barely shakes his head. Don’t get him wrong, it’s nice of Lance to include him in the conversation, but this isn’t like him at all.

_Okay. Whatever._

Either the queen doesn’t see their back and forth, or she doesn’t care.

“Mermaids? How incredible,” The queen doesn’t spare Keith a glance, “I’m sure they were grateful for your help.”

“I guess.” Lance replies politely.

“Speaking of help,” Keith interrupts, “I was wondering if you could tell us more about how you would like us to train your people.”

Keith really does want to know more, but he speaks more out of a desire to get the panicked look out of Lance’s eyes. It reminds him too much of the way Lance’s voice sounds in his nightmares. Also, it stirs something protective in Keith when Lance gets uncomfortable. He doesn’t know why, it just does. He doesn’t dwell on it.

Finally, with what appears to be great difficulty, the queen moves her eyes from Lance to Keith. The smile drops off of her face and she gives him a polite upturn of her lips.

“We know the Galra are coming. We would like you both to train our people in hand to hand combat and whatever else you deem suitable. Did I answer your question?” The queen intones, sugary sweet.

“I guess,” Keith’s annoyed by her obvious pretentious behavior, “I would also like to know why your people are not already preparing for battle when you have already sent the distress call.”

The queen’s polite smile gives way for a frown. “My people are not a violent people. We do not engage in war or battle. Who would train them? We were forced to wait for our honored guests to arrive.” Her voice is still polite, but Keith can tell it’s irritating to have to hold it.

“Okay, well, I’m sure you also have some cool stories, right? You’re the queen, you have to have seen some weird things.” Lance inserts himself in the conversation, obviously trying to play peace maker.

It works. The queen abandons any grudge with Keith in order to talk to Lance.

“None that would compare to yours, I’m afraid,” The queen leans in toward Lance, into his space, “Tell me, are the missing paladins at Adrik as beautiful as you?”

The question takes Lance off guard, who flounders for a second while he registers the forthright flirting.

“Well, I mean, I guess we’re all about the same. I mean, obviously I’m handsome,” Lance says. He bounces back easily enough, “I’m sure they’re jealous.”

The queen laughs and puts her hand on Lance’s arm. Lance’s eyes flick over to Keith. He pretends not to see it, examining the pattern on his dinner plate.

_This didn’t use to be so painful to watch._

“Actually, you know what? I’m not feeling so good. I think that maybe we should head back to our room.” Lance says, slipping his arm out from under the queen’s.

Keith looks up at that, catching Lance’s eye. He doesn’t know what Lance is doing, usually he’d be all over this but Keith just goes with it. Maybe Lance really isn’t feeling okay.

“Yeah, we’re pretty tired,” Keith agrees easily, “Thank you for the meal.” He’s too polite and it makes him feel good to see the queen recognize it, her mouth pulling into a thin line.

“Yes, of course,” The queen says, clearly disappointed at having lost the chance to flirt with Lance some more, “enjoy your rest.”

With that, the two paladins get up and start the trek back to their room.

In the hall, it’s just the two of them, their footsteps echoing off the floor as they walk in silence. Keith replays the dinner in his head as they go. He’s confused and irritated, both at Lance’s behavior and his own. Since when does he care who does and doesn’t flirt with Lance?

They find their room, neither of them having said a word. They open the door and Keith is reminded about the bed situation and his talk with Shiro. Keith is exhausted and the thought of having to have this talk right now with Lance makes him wish he could just sink into the floor.

“Hey, Lance?” He hates how small his voice sounds.

Lance stops from where he’d been sliding his shoes off next to the table. “Yeah?” He’s got his full attention.

Keith takes a few more steps into the room and sits at the table next to where Lance is standing. Lance takes the hint and takes a seat. Lance cocks his head at him.

“I have to tell you something.” Keith says awkwardly. He hates this.

Lance leans forward. “Okay?” He’s obviously waiting for Keith to get on with it.

“I have nightmares at night, about you. Sometimes I cry in my sleep and wake up screaming your name.” He gets it all out in one go, his face heating up. God, this is so embarrassing.

Lance seems taken aback, physically leaning back in his chair. He stares at Keith. Keith fights the urge to ask what his problem is. They need to get through this.

“Okay.” Lance says, like he thinks there’s more coming.

“That’s it? Okay?” Keith intones, a little irritated that this was so difficult for him and Lance didn’t seem to care.

“Well yeah,” Lance starts, “I don’t see what the big deal is. I have nightmares about you all the time.” He shrugs like_what can you do_.

That floors Keith. He gapes at Lance. Why was he so nonchalant? _I have nightmares about you all the time. _As if Lance has spared him a second thought, ever.

“You do?” Keith asks, trying to make sure he heard right.

“Yeah. All the time. Dreams about you dying, getting hurt, getting tortured. The whole nine yards,” Lance hesitates, “If it makes you feel any better, I cry in my sleep too.”

They sit there at the table for a long time. Keith processes this new information.

_He trusts you. He does._

Keith doesn’t know what to do now. He hadn’t expected for Lance to share this with him. He wants to feel weird about it, but all he feels is relief that someone knows what he’s going through and a random bout of affection that Lance cares that much about him. Keith thinks about it some more and he realizes that Lance has always cared. This morning, saying goodbye to Shiro Lance had given the two of them a private moment to say goodbye when he could have hurried them along. Or at dinner, trying to include Keith in the conversation. He also realizes that _he’s _always cared about _Lance_. Keith thinks about his need to always know where Lance is at, or the protective feeling he gets when Lance is uncomfortable. The two are a lot closer than he thought, and that’s a new feeling.

“Okay.” Keith finally says with a nod, meeting Lance’s eyes.

“Okay.” Lance agrees, voice soft.

They sit for a moment or two longer, silent understanding cementing.

“I’m going to go shower.” Lance finally says, standing from his chair and heading into the bathroom. Keith doesn’t answer, just nods and gets up from his spot to go mess with whatever’s in the dresser so he doesn’t have to look at Lance anymore.

Keith waits for the shower to start running before he turns to face the bed. It doesn’t feel so claustrophobic anymore, knowing that Lance is just as likely as he is to wake up in the middle of the night. He figures out the small lamp on the night table, turning it on so Lance will be able to see when he comes out of the bathroom. He turns out the main light and crawls into bed. He’ll shower in the morning. For now, he just wants to sleep.

_I cry in my sleep too._

Maybe Keith will sleep a little better tonight. Maybe Lance will too.


	2. Sharpshooter and Samurai

Keith wakes up naturally. He keeps his eyes closed, basking in the feeling of not jolting awake. He didn’t have any nightmares. It’s almost euphoric, the feeling of having slept through the night.

Eventually, he rolls over on to his back and blinks his eyes open. He turns his head to the side and sees Lance, still sleeping peacefully. He looks calm, his form relaxed. His hair is sticking up on the side and the blanket slid off of him during the night. Keith kind of feels like a creep watching him, but it’s rare he gets to see Lance when he’s not goofing around to make everyone laugh.

_He’s cute like that._

Keith turns back to look at the ceiling. He thinks maybe he should be worried about himself and his feelings about Lance lately, whatever they are, but instead he just thinks it’s kind of nice to not be fighting with him all the time. Besides, it’s pretty obvious that Lance is handsome, who wouldn’t think that? Assured in the idea that his reaction to Lance’s face is a universal phenomenon, Keith feels a bit better.

Keith sits up slowly, the blanket he’d hoarded last night slipping as he does. He slides out of the bed as quietly as he can and is relieved when Lance doesn’t wake. Grabbing a new set of clothes from the dresser, Keith makes his way into the bathroom.

He showers, enjoying the hot water and the large shower. He picks up one of the bottles already in there and finds he can’t read the label. He assumes it’s some kind of soap and massages it into his hair. It smells nice, kind of earthy. Pine, maybe.

He thinks over his plans for today as he washes himself. They have to start training the Avirans today. Keith can do hand to hand combat, with or without weapons. He curses, annoyed. Weapons. If the Avirans don’t engage in battles, they have no weapons. He doesn’t know what to do about that. They have to have weapons in order to fight the Galra or it’ll be a massacre. They will have to ask the queen about it.

_Great, more face time with my favorite person._

Irritated but resolved, Keith turns back to planning. If he handles the hand to hand combat, Lance can teach shooting skills. They don’t have enough time to turn the Avirans into master assassins, but it’ll be better than nothing. He washes the soap from his hair and gets out of the shower. He changes into his new set of clothes only to find they’re another pair of the same clothes from yesterday. He shrugs and towels off his hair, opening the door to the bathroom.

Lance is sitting up in bed, holding a pillow in his lap. He looks like he’s still half asleep. Keith wonders if he always wakes up so disoriented or if it’s just the current sleeping situation. Lance turns his head to look at Keith, the sound of the door opening catching his attention.

“Are you okay?” Lance asks, voice still rough from sleep.

Keith is confused for a moment before it he realizes that Lance thinks he woke up because he had a nightmare.

“Yeah, I just wanted a shower.” Keith holds up his damp towel as evidence.

Lance nods once, a smile creeping onto his face. Keith understands completely. No nightmares. It’s actually kind of sad, how happy this one little thing makes them. Just being able to sleep through the night is a luxury these days.

Keith holds the towel in his hand for a second as he looks for a hamper of some kind. He spots Lance’s towel from yesterday in a little bin next to the dresser and walks over to add his to it. It hits him how weird it is that alien societies also have bath towels. Keith mentally shrugs, depositing his dirty towel and moving to sit at the table, wishing they had a couch or something to sit on instead.

“We’re going to have to ask the queen about locating some weapons.” Keith thinks it’s probably a good idea to fill Lance in on the plan he concocted in the shower.

Lance scrubs a hand over his face before climbing out of the bed. He stands next to it stretching, his simple pajama shirt riding up. “You don’t think they have weapons?”

Keith’s eyes flicker to the little exposed portion of skin on Lance’s waist before moving back to his face. “The queen said they don’t engage in battle. If they don’t engage in battle, why would they have weapons?”

“I guess that’s true. It just seems kind of stupid to not have any, whether they’re fighters or not.” Lance’s nose scrunches up in thought, and Keith finds it kind of endearing. Lance slides his dresser drawer open, pulling out a new set of clothes.

“You don’t think it’s kind of weird that they’ve never had a need for any?” Something about this whole thing doesn’t sit right with Keith. He leans his head on his hand, sitting sideways in his chair so he can look at Lance.

Lance stops, tilting his head as he thinks it over. “I don’t know. I would like to think there are some planets capable of not fighting amongst themselves,” he holds up his pile of clothes, “I’m going to change. You think on that some more, Samurai, I’ll be right back.”

Keith rolls his eyes at the nick-name, despite the little lurch his heart gives at it. He _does_think on it while Lance is changing. Maybe Keith’s just cynical, but he doesn’t really believe a society can go its whole history without fighting amongst itself. It doesn’t seem likely that the Avirans have gone thousands of years having never had a war, or a faction, or an uprising of some kind.

“Any revelations you would like to share with the class?” Lance asks dramatically as he steps back into the room. He’s also wearing the same outfit as yesterday. His hair is laying in a more coordinated manner than the nest he woke up with.

“Yeah,” Keith replies bluntly, “I think the queen is full of shit.”

It startles a laugh out of Lance, the clear sound of it briefly filling the room. Keith smiles despite his actual belief in the statement.

“Guess we can ask her and find out.” Lance says with a shrug, smile still on his face. He joins Keith, pulling a chair out and plopping down in it. He smells good, like the pine soap in the shower.

“That’s what I thought too,” Keith agrees, “I think the first item on the agenda is asking the queen about weapons. We’ll see where we get from there. We can’t train the Avirans without them.”

Lance nods. “Sounds like a plan. I just think your plan should include breakfast,” Lance points a finger at him, “you might be able to get away with your weird ability to not ever eat, but the rest of us mortals require sustenance.”

Keith slaps the finger out of his face. “I guess you’re just at a lower level of existence than me.”

“Hey, I resent that.” Lance shoots back, the tone of his voice betraying the angry face he’s trying to hold, a smile pulling at the corner of his lips.

Keith shrugs, standing from the table. “We’ll see what we can find.”

* * *

They end up locating the kitchen and the queen at the same time. The kitchen is relatively small for a palace this size, but ornately decorated despite the staff being the only ones to see it. There’s pots and pans meticulously put away and jars of spices and things lining the shelves over the countertops. There’s things in there that Keith doesn’t even recognize but thinks Hunk would love.

“As I have told you many times, meals are to be served in a punctual manner. Please do not let this happen again, I am growing tired of having to address this issue.” The queen is standing in front of a small group of kitchen staff, reprimanding them. Keith’s thankful they only caught the end of it. The queen makes a dismissive gesture with one of her long arms and the kitchen staff scurries out of sight. Her eyes widen as she turns and finds them watching her.

“Oh, paladins, you startled me. I’m sorry you missed the morning meal.” The queen gives them a polite smile full of teeth. It seemed the queen is back to her pastel dresses, today’s a light blue color. Keith wonders if she chose it based on a certain guest of hers.

“Don’t worry about it,” Lance waves a hand, “We’ll find something ourselves. Sorry we missed it, we slept late.” Keith is reminded of just how comfortable he’d been this morning and his bad mood at having to be in the same room as the queen dissipates a little.

“It’s no matter, I’m glad you found your room comfortable.” With a little bow, the queen makes to walk away.

“Actually, your highness,” Keith cuts in before she can leave, “we wanted to ask you about Aviran weapons.” He thought it best to keep his tone as polite as he can, at least to start out with. Shiro is constantly telling him he’ll catch more flies with honey.

The queen seems bored as she makes her way back toward them, eyes on Keith. “I believe you are mistaken. The Avirans have no weapons.” She doesn’t seem surprised at the question and it doesn’t make any sense to Keith as to why she hasn’t said anything on the topic already. She had to know this discussion was coming, right?

“Yes, but if you would like us to train your people for battle, weapons will be required.” Keith responds, watching her intently.

The queen stares back at him for a moment, gaze moving to Lance before landing on him again. It looks like she’s debating something and Keith doesn’t like it.

“Your highness?” Lance prompts softly, clearly not liking her silence either.

The queen sighs heavily before speaking again. “Well, there is one thing that may be of service to you.”

“We’re all ears.” Keith wants her to get on with it.

She clasps her hands behind her back, both sets moving at the same time, as if she wants to prolong having to have this discussion. Keith wonders if it’s more about wanting them to stay hooked on her every word.

“There is a Galra armory ship that has been spotted not far from here. I believe it is small enough that two Voltron paladins would be more than enough to raid it.” The queen’s tone is even and professional, as if she’s just laying down the facts and not suggesting that they undertake an entire mission by themselves.

Keith’s stunned into silence. Let him get this straight, the queen of Avira wanted Lance and Keith to take their lions, go on a dangerous mission to raid a Galra warship for weapons, come back to Avira, and then use those very weapons to teach the Avirans to defend themselves against the very people they’d stolen the weapons from in the first place? That was fucked up. That was too much to ask of them. Sure, they were defenders of the universe but that didn’t mean they signed up for more danger than was strictly necessary.

“Your highness…,” Lance hesitates, “That’s way beyond dangerous. It’s just me and Keith. Sure, we’re paladins, but you’re talking about an entire Galra ship.” Lance keeps his tone polite but it’s strained around the edges. Keith can relate.

“I’m aware,” The queen lifts her chin, “But if weapons are needed for you to defend this planet against the Galra, then I believe Voltron has promised to provide.” The queen’s smile fades, a scowl taking its place.

She’s right, technically speaking. Their job is to do whatever has to get done in order to defend the Avirans. Keith knew they never should have split up from the very beginning. Of course something like this would happen to them when it was just him and Lance. Shiro is going to lose it when Keith tells him about this. No, he won’t tell Shiro. He’ll just tell Keith not to go and to wait for Shiro and the others to join them. The Galra could attack within that timeframe, and Keith doesn’t want to risk Adrik either. They have to have weapons to defend against the Galra, and they have to do this mission to get them.

“Okay, have it your way. We’ll return with what’s in the armory.” Keith consents, trying not to let her have a piece of his mind.

“What?” Lance gasps, “You can’t be serious, Keith.” He takes a few steps toward Keith, pulling him by the arm a little ways away from the queen. He tells himself it’s not okay to punch the ruler of an alien nation when he catches sight of the queen’s sneer as he passes her. “Are you insane? We’ll die, Keith. I like not dying.”

Keith shrugs out of Lance’s hold, taking a step back. “She’s right, we have to go. If the Galra attack and we have no weapons we’re all dead anyways.” Lance looks a little pale, and Keith feels bad about not asking him first. He can see in Lance’s face the moment he realizes Keith is right, resignation pulling the expression from his face. Keith doesn’t like that look at all.

“Hey, we’ll be okay,” He pokes Lance in the ribcage, mirroring him from yesterday, “The Galra don’t stand a chance against Sharpshooter and Samurai, right?” He asks softly, holding Lance’s gaze.

Lance gives him a weak smile for his effort. “Right.”

Later, when they actually do find some breakfast, Keith thinks Lance still doesn’t look convinced.

* * *

They make a pretense of walking a quick loop around the castle, as if they’re going to do something productive while they wait on more info from the queen, but they give up on it pretty quickly.

They’re back in their room, going stir crazy, when a knock disrupts the quiet. They get the coordinates for the Galra armory ship from one of the queen’s messengers, who apologizes and says the queen sends her regrets. Apparently, she’s currently too busy to aid them in their mission. Keith looks down at the little scrap of paper with the location written on it, thumb tracing over the writing. He thanks the Aviran at the door and shuts it behind him.

Keith sets the paper down on top of the dresser. He doesn’t want to look at it anymore. Lance hasn’t really said anything to him since breakfast, and it unsettles Keith. It has to be two or three in the afternoon, Earth time, and all they can do is wait but Keith can’t stand to look at the hollow dullness in Lance’s eyes. He isn’t sure why this particular mission is making Lance act like this. They’ve been on more dangerous missions than this.

They pass the time, mostly in silence. Keith makes a few attempts at getting Lance to talk to him by commenting on the queen’s dress today or how they haven’t seen Rhaegar in a while. He suggests that they go out and talk to the locals and gather information but Lance doesn’t even seem interested at the prospect of fresh air and a new female alien species. Eventually, Keith gives up on it figuring Lance will have to work it out on his own.

Sometime after Keith’s helmet lets him know it’s close to ten at night Earth time, Lance moves to go shower. He gathers what he needs without saying a word to Keith. He doesn’t look at him as he goes. Keith’s taken to pacing the floor as he thinks. He wants to think about how they’re going to raid the ship, but all he can think about his how much he misses the way Pidge falls asleep in the lounge with her glasses on and Shiro always carries her to bed. He misses the rest of the team.

Keith’s already in bed when Lance emerges from the bathroom, steam billowing behind him. He’s found one of two books off of the table that’s in English, Homer’s The Odyssey, and is pretending to read it so as to not stare at Lance. Keith had to read this for a literature class when he was in school. He thinks it’s kind of funny how the universe would allow this book to arrive on an alien planet he is on, years after he read it. He tries not to think too hard about it. It hurts his brain.

“Are we…going to bed?” Lance questions quietly, hair still wet and standing awkwardly next to the bed.

Keith looks up from the book he’s not reading. “Uh…yeah?” He doesn’t mean for it to be a question, but he just assumed that with how tired they always are and the upcoming fight they’re going to have they should take advantage of a safe place to sleep.

“Oh…okay.” Lance mumbles, pushing a hand through the short strands of his hair before climbing into bed next to Keith. It’s weird and kind of awkward all of a sudden and Keith doesn’t understand how tonight is different than last night. Does Lance not want to share a bed?

Keith puts the book down on the floor. He looks down at the covers, twisting them in his hands. “I can sleep on the floor?”

“No. No, that’s…you’re fine.” Lance’s voice is soft, barely audible. He turns onto his side facing away from Keith.

Keith doesn’t need any more of his time wasted on today, and so he just turns the light out without a word. He lays down and closes his eyes and hopes it’s better in the morning.

* * *

They don’t make it that far. Keith has no idea what time it is when he gets woken up. At first he’s not even sure what woke him. Then he gets hit in the arm by Lance’s rogue hand again.

“Ow, quit it.” Keith’s tired and he doesn’t appreciate the three AM wake up call.

“Keith…” Lance’s voice is barely audible.

“What?” Keith snaps, sitting up in bed so he can get a proper look at Lance and figure out what the fuck he wants.

Except Lance isn’t awake. He’s asleep. The covers he went to sleep with are thrown off, and his limbs lay haphazard on the bed. His face is scrunched up in pain and Keith can see tear tracks on his face.

“Keith…no..” A little louder this time and Lance sticks his arm out, hitting him again.

A nightmare. Lance is having a nightmare. He doesn’t know what to do. He’s never seen it from this perspective, only experienced it himself. His heart lurches as he watches Lance suffer and he doesn’t think much before he acts. He scoots closer to Lance, sitting up fully in bed now.

“It’s okay, you’re okay.” Keith soothes, reaching down to run a hand through Lance’s hair.

Lance seems to be getting more upset, his dream obviously progressing. Keith can’t stand to watch it anymore and resolves to wake him up.

“Lance?” He calls softly, shaking him by the shoulder. The touch seems to startle Lance awake, who sits up quickly.

“Keith?” Lance doesn’t wait for a reply, just throws his arms around Keith’s neck and pulls him close. Keith retains his stiff posture for a moment before he relaxes, smoothing a hand over Lance’s back. He knows how it feels to dream like that. There’s no way he could ever hold it against Lance.

“Yeah, it’s me, you’re okay. You’re okay.” Keith mumbles into his hair, rocking them a little as they sit in the dark. Lance tucks his face into Keith’s neck and Keith can feel the dampness on his cheeks from where he’d been crying. Lance is still shaking but at least the tears have stopped.

“They shot you, I couldn’t get to you in time and I thought you were going to die.” Lance speaks into his neck.

Keith knows logically that Lance has nightmares about him, but he’s never really thought about that until he’s confronted with it now. He thinks it’s awfully cruel of the universe to make them have nightmares about each other like this. He wonders why they had so many disagreements and petty fights in the past. None of that seems to matter when he’s got this blue-eyed boy tucked into him like this. Sure, it’s not a habit of theirs to cozy up to each other, but it doesn’t feel weird or wrong at all. Just comforting.

_I keep thinking everything we do is supposed to feel weird and wrong and it never does._

“It was just a dream, I’m okay. We’re okay.” Keith pulls back a little to try and look at his face, but Lance doesn’t him let get very far, gluing himself to Keith’s chest. He’s surprised at the lack of protest to having Keith see him like this.

_He trusts you._

“What about tomorrow, huh? Tomorrow we’re going to raid a Galra ship by ourselves and there’s a very real possibility my dream could come true,” Lance rushes out, hiccupping, “It could happen tomorrow. Don’t you see that?”

Keith finally forces some distance between them, moving to put his hands on Lance’s cheeks instead, forcing him to look at Keith. “Hey, nothing is going to happen to me,” Keith says softly, trying to calm him, “tomorrow is going to be just like any other mission. It’ll be fine. I’m going to watch your back just like you’ll watch mine. Nothing is going to happen.” Of course, Keith can’t guarantee that with their line of work, but he knows he’ll give his all protecting Lance and he knows Lance will be right there with him.

Lance nods, the soft sound of Keith’s voice having done its job. He isn’t shaking anymore either, just sitting there in front of Keith while he touches his face. He comes to the realization that Lance’s bizarre behavior from yesterday was worry. He was worried about Keith and the mission because he sees it all the time in his nightmares.

“I trust you.” Keith feels like he should return the favor. He knows that right now must be embarrassing for Lance. He’s vulnerable right now, confessing to crying over Keith’s wellbeing.

That must be what Lance needs to hear because he finally looks Keith in the eyes, cheeks a little red. Lance sits up a little straighter in their bed, some of the life returning to his eyes as if Keith’s trust is something honorable to hold. He thinks it’s no wonder Lance is a paladin.

“Thanks,” Lance mumbles, clearly embarrassed now that the worst was over, “I trust you too.”

Keith knows.

As they try to get back to sleep, Keith thinks that none of Shiro’s bonding exercises could ever compare.

* * *

They wake up tired the next morning, of course. There’s not a lot to be done about it and Keith doesn’t hold it against Lance. Shit happens. They dress quietly, with none of their usual banter. Keith thinks Lance is still a little embarrassed about last night and doesn’t prod at him.

They eat breakfast in the kitchen like yesterday, luckily avoiding the queen this time around.

“Imagine if we died in space having an allergic reaction to alien food. What a way to go.”

]Keith rolls his eyes, inwardly glad Lance seems to have bounced back.

“If I die because of that I’m coming back to haunt you.” Keith throws one of the little grape like fruits he’s eating at Lance. It bounces off of his cheek and Lance looks affronted.

Lance throws one of his own pseudo grapes at Keith. “Great, I can’t wait to have a ghost follow me around that leaves his socks in the changing area of the shower and thinks that shampoo is acceptable face wash.”

Keith goes to throw another grape at him, but stops at the glare from one of the kitchen’s cooks.

“When we get back I’m stealing all of your face masks and hiding them in Coran’s room.” Keith warns him, narrowing his eyes.

Lance makes a face like _you wouldn’t dare_, and Keith raises an eyebrow in challenge.

“Good luck on your mission today. I pray it goes well.” The queen interrupts their bickering. He ponders whether it’s more likely whether the queen was looking for them or if she was here to yell at her kitchen staff again. It turns out to be the first one.

“I’m assuming you are making an immediate departure as soon as you’re finished here?” It’s clear it’s not a question. They will be leaving after breakfast. Lance’s face falls at the reminder and Keith is more annoyed by that than anything else.

“Yes, your highness.” He spits. The queen looks offended by his tone, nose turned up at him, but he can’t bring himself to care. They’ll do the job and get the hell off this planet and he’ll never see her again. The queen doesn’t lower herself to respond, instead leaving with a swoosh of her skirt.

As ordered, their lions take off for the given coordinates as soon as they finish.

It’s not a long flight. Their ETA is only thirty minutes out. He keeps in contact with Lance over the comms as they fly, both to check in and to make sure he sounds okay. He goes over the plan with him.

“In order for us to make it out with whatever weapons they have on board, we can’t just open fire on the ship. We can’t destroy the cargo and we don’t want to draw attention to ourselves. We’re outnumbered as it is.” He waits for Lance’s affirmation.

“Got it.” His voice is outlined in static where it comes through his helmet.

“Honestly, I think the best course of action will be to just wait for a ship to come out of one of the hangars and fly the lions in before the door shuts. We’ll avoid setting off alarms like that and have a better chance of making a quick exit,” He pauses considering, “from there we’ll just have to find their cargo hold and carry the crates back to the lions. It’ll be slow going but it will cause less of a fuss.”

Lance’s end is quiet.

“Lance?” He asks, unsure if he was heard.

“No, I’m here, I was just thinking. What about the guards? We can’t sneak past an armed cargo hold without raising the alarm. I’ll have to shoot them out as we go.”

Keith hadn’t even considered that. “Yeah, you’re right. That’s a good plan.”

“Thanks.” Lance sounds surprised by the compliment.

The rest of the flight is done in slowly growing anticipation. Finally, they spot the grey and purple monstrosity that is a Galra ship. Except it’s way bigger than promised. The queen had said he and Lance would be able to take it down by themselves no problem, but this ship is nowhere near their level. Judging by its size, it has to be carrying cargo for multiple port locations for the empire. Keith counts twenty hangar doors.

“No way.” Lance sounds firm over the comm.

“We have to.”

“No we don’t, call Shiro.” Lance’s voice is rising.

“Lance, you know we can’t do that. We already said we’d do it. The plan doesn’t change.” Keith fights back.

“This is a death wish, Keith. I know you don’t think much before you act, but this is a stupid idea.” Lance says harshly over the comm, angry now.

“I’m just doing what we have to,” Keith bit back, “Now you can come with me or not, I’m going.” He knew it was a low blow. Sure enough, Lance’s lion stayed right next to his.

They sit in tense silence, hovering in space while they wait at a distance for one of the Galra ships housed within the larger Cargo ship to leave. One does, eventually, and Keith makes his move. They fly in as quick as possible without causing suspicion, touching down on the empty landing pad. He exits his lion and waits for Lance to join him, checking his surroundings. Nothing seems to be out of place. Well, except them.

Lance is scowling when he meets Keith’s side. “Let’s just get this over with.”

“It’ll be okay.” Keith reminds him, pulling his bayard. Lance nods and relaxes his shoulders a little but retains his grip on his rifle. “Let’s go.”

Keith leads them out of the hangar and into the main hall. There are no guards immediately present and Keith is grateful. He does his best to decide which way the armory part of the cargo would be and goes left. He follows the hallway down, feet silent on the ground as they go. Lance’s rifle goes off, beam of light flashing in the corner of his eye, and he turns to see that Lance has shot down one of the guards who had been patrolling behind them.

“Thanks.” Keith says, a little unnerved he didn’t sense it.

“Don’t mention it.”

They continue on. Just when Keith starts to get worried they’re lost, he sees a wide door with a touchpad mounted next to it. This has to be it. It’s a cargo ship. He knows there’s going to be guards posted inside the door.

“Cover me.”

“Of course.” Lance almost sounds offended.

They hurry along and make their way up to the door. Keith puts his hand over the sensor and prays that it’ll work. It does, the door sliding open with a whoosh as the pressure system activates. Lance is inside immediately, the sound of his rifle going off. None of the other guards get a shot in. Lance smirks at him, twirling his bayard around his finger. Keith just shakes his head, hiding his grin.

The room they’re in is giant. There’s crates upon crates stacked high in the air. They’re labeled, luckily with pictures, and he spots one with a purple painted Galra weapon on the side. He beckons Lance over to him and points, and Lance heads that way. They open one of the crates, sliding the top off so they can see what’s inside. He doesn’t know what he was expecting, but he’s almost disappointed when it’s just regular foot soldier Galra weaponry, maybe ten or so guns. He slides the top back on, lifting the crate. It’s heavy, but manageable. With ten guns to a crate, this will take them a while and it makes Keith feel uneasy. He hands the crate to Lance before grabbing his own.

They start back the way they came, picking up the pace. They had to leave the first Galra guard in the hall where anyone could see him. Keith doesn’t like that in order to carry the crates, they don’t have easy access to their bayards. It goes like that for a while, them stepping over the downed guard on every trip. It’s half an hour into the mission that shit hits the fan.

They’re on their way back to the cargo hold for more crates. They get to the spot where the downed soldier is supposed to be, only to come across nothing. The guard has either gotten up or been moved. Lance is a pretty good shot, so he guesses it’s the second one.

“We need to go.” He says quickly, shoving at Lance to turn back around. A flash of light whips past his head and hits the wall next to him, scorch mark steaming in the metal wall.

That’s all the motivation they need and they take off at a run back to where they left their lions. Shots whip past their heads as they run, feet echoing off of the metal floor. The eerie purple lighting lining the ceiling and floors only aids in reminding Keith that they’re on enemy territory.

He chances a look back over his shoulder and sees what must be twenty guards with guns running after them and shooting. They’re fucked. Lance must be able to sense his panic because he takes one look at Keith before he turns, firing over his shoulder with his bayard. He hears the sound of metal hitting metal as some of the guards fall and their armor hits the floor.

They round a corner and Keith grabs onto Lance’s arm, pulling him along. They’re almost there. They come across the closed door to the hangar and it kills Keith that they have to stop so he can put his hand over the sensor. The guards only gain a few seconds on them, but it’s enough that they’re within sight. The door slides open and Lance pulls him through, running at a dead sprint. He can see their lions. Lance makes it to Blue first, a little ahead of him.

“Go! I’ll catch up!” Keith yells at Lance, motioning for him to keep going.

Suddenly, there’s a pain in his left side that needs attention and he stops. He looks down at his side putting his hand over where it hurts before looking up at Lance in confusion. He knows he needs to move, he can’t just stand here while they get shot at. Lance has turned and is sprinting toward him, eyes wide and screaming his name.

“Keith!” His yells desperately, doing his best to dodge the shots aimed at him.

Keith lifts his hand and finds that it’s covered in blood. He’s bleeding. He realizes he got shot. The idea shocks him into motion and he takes a few panicked steps toward Lance, who ducks under his arm to hold him up as soon as he’s within reach. Lance is saying something into his ear but he can’t understand what it is. Everything’s going a little fuzzy around the edges.

“I got shot.” Keith says bluntly, slurring his words a little. He doesn’t even know if Lance is listening but he thinks he should tell him anyway.

Lance half drags half carries Keith into the Blue lion, depositing him on the floor gently before booking it to the captain’s chair. He can feel it as Lance rips the door off of the ship’s hangar with Blue’s claws, it jars his side and he hisses.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Lance repeats, getting them the hell out of there.

Keith’s eyelids are so heavy. He feels light headed and he can see he has blood all over his shirt. From his spot on the floor he can’t really tell where they are, but he can’t hear gunfire anymore.

“You’re okay. You’re going to be okay.” Lance tells him, turning his head to look at him every few seconds despite the fact that he’s crying, tears running down his face and dripping from his chin. It’s almost exactly what Keith said to him last night.

Keith has slumped over, unable to hold himself up anymore, and he can hear Lance calling to him in panic. He wants to stay awake and tell Lance he’s okay, but he can’t muster the energy.

He passes out before they make it back to Avira.


	3. Pudding

Keith wakes up because of a sharp pain in his abdomen. It hurts like a motherfucker, and he keeps his eyes closed as he tries to focus on something else. He does his best to get a sense of his surroundings. He’s in a bed, probably the one in his and Lance’s room. He’s groggy, and all of his joints feel stiff. His face is warm from light shining on his face through the window.

“Sir, I need to move him onto his side in order to change the bandages.” A woman’s voice intones, sounding like someone who’s had this exact conversation several times. The sound of someone else in the room startles him, and he just manages to retain feigning sleep.

“I changed them an hour ago. I can take care of him just fine.” It’s Lance’s voice. He sounds exhausted. Fuck, his side hurts so bad. The woman mentioned bandages. Keith thinks that’s probably important information. Flashes of sprinting with Lance in a Galra hangar pop up in his mind, and he remembers. He got shot. He was bleeding.

The woman makes an irritated noise. “I will leave this with you. Feed it to him should he complain of pain.” Now the voice is resigned, as if she can’t be bothered to fight the issue.

“Will do.” There’s the sound of a glass container bumping against something, and then nothing.

He blinks his eyes open to find Lance sitting in a chair next to his bed eating something with a spoon. It’s brown and thick, like a dessert would be. “Are you eating pudding?” His voice is hoarse, and he’s curious as to just how long he’s been out. “Can I have some?”

Lance whips his head up to look at him, immediately putting the food down on a small side table. “You absolute dickhead.” Lance is pulling his chair closer to Keith’s head, leaning into his space. This close, Keith can see the dark circles under his eyes, and the way his hair is messed up like he’s been repeatedly running a hand through it. Overall, Lance looks like he’s the one who should be in the bed.

Keith blinks up at him. “So, is that a no on the pudding?” He asks, trying to lighten the mood. It’s obvious he scared Lance. He can tell by the way Lance keeps meeting his eyes, like he’s making sure Keith’s really awake.

Lance lets out a breath and lets his head fall on the pillow next to Keith’s head, his hair tickling Keith’s cheek. “I thought you were dead.” Lance’s voice is hollow, and Keith immediately feels guilty.

“I’m sorry.” He knows that Lance hadn’t wanted to move forward with the mission when the ship was bigger than anticipated. Lance hadn’t wanted to do the mission in the first place. On top of that, Keith knows he has nightmares of him getting shot. Keith has fucked up big time because of his inability to slow down and listen several times in the past. This is just one more to add to the list. Honestly, Keith is grateful Lance hasn’t told him ‘I told you so’.

Lance’s breath hitches, and Keith realizes he’s crying. A surge of protectiveness brings his hand up to touch Lance’s back, the awkward angle preventing him from doing much besides grazing him with his hand. “I’m really sorry.” His voice is quiet, but earnest. There isn’t much he can say now.

Lance picks his head up to wipe his eyes, looking away from Keith. He looks more shaken than Keith has ever seen him. Keith takes the opportunity to touch him, to reassure him that he isn’t going anywhere. He reaches for Lance’s hand, pulling it away from his face to place it on his own chest, right over his heart. Lance peers down at their hands and then up at Keith’s face, and he gives Lance a few moments to feel his heart beating in his chest. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Lance must find the touch comforting, because he bends down to press his forehead against Keith’s. The proximity surprises him, but he doesn’t dislike it.

_It feels good to touch him._

“If you ever scare me like that again…” Lance leaves the threat open ended.

“You’ll what?” Keith can’t resist poking at him, even now.

Lance hits him lightly on the shoulder and sits back up, leaning back in his chair. He grabs his dessert off the table. “I’ll kill you.” Keith laughs, wincing when it pulls on the wound in his abdomen. He lifts the blanket off of him to look down at his torso.

On his lower left side, just above his hip, there’s a bandage about the size of his palm. Bullets that are made of lasers inherently cause wounds to be through and through, and Keith knows he must have a matching bandage on his back at the same height. It’s an incredibly lucky spot to get hit, with no organs in the path of the light.

“You bled so much that I haven’t been inside of Blue since.”

It’s said with a certain level of casualness, and Keith doesn’t even know what to say to that. ‘I’m sorry’ won’t cut it, and anything else seems insincere in comparison. He looks at Lance’s face, but Lance is focused on his food, staring into the container like it’ll solve all his problems.

“I’ll clean her when I’m better.” Keith promises. And he will, Lance doesn’t need to see that again. He’s already done more than enough for Keith. Lance just nods his thanks.

They sit quietly for a little while before he acknowledges the burning question. “How long have I been out?” He asks. He almost doesn’t want to know.

Lance hesitates, folding his arms over his chest in an unconscious defensive position. “A week.” Keith does a double take, eyes wide. That’s too long. An entire week. Anything could have happened in that amount of time. The Galra could have attacked and the civilians would have been defenseless. He wonders if Lance updated Shiro and the others on his condition.

He suddenly remembers all the crates in their lions. “What about the weapons? Do we have those?” If he got shot, he at least wants it to have been worth it. He’ll be pissed if they showed back up here with nothing.

_Red isn’t here._

Keith sits up in the bed, cringing as pain rocks through him from the wound in his side. “Red. Where’s the red lion?” Lance had flown him out of the hangar. They must have left her behind. He feels a dull sense of panic about that, but it’s secondary to the throbbing in his abdomen. It hurts so much it’s getting hard to think of anything else. He can feel sweat beading on his hairline.

Lance pushes him back down to lay on the bed gently, a hand on his shoulder. “She’s still in the hangar. All we have are the weapons that are in Blue.” Keith feels horrible. He left her with the Galra. If he’s been out for a week and she still hasn’t shown up, it’s possible the Galra are keeping her hostage somehow. He stares at the ceiling, trying to keep a lid on his pain. Lance must sense it though because he twists the cap off a glass vial the size of an AA battery and hands it to Keith. It has a dark purple liquid in it.

“They gave me this to give you for the pain. I don’t know what it is, don’t ask me.” Lance shrugs, watching Keith down it in one go. “Let’s hope it’s the good stuff.” Keith thinks maybe he should be a bit worried about drinking mysterious liquids, but he doesn’t have it in him to look into it. He turns his head on the pillow so he can see Lance easier. He looks like he’s thinking hard about something, eyebrows furrowed, and lip caught between his teeth.

“Don’t think too hard, wouldn’t want to hurt yourself.” Keith can feel the corner of his mouth twitching with the effort of trying not to smile. Lance gives him a long look, but Keith can tell he isn’t really offended.

“The queen seemed surprised to see me.” Lance says in explanation, propping his legs up on the bed by Keith’s feet. He doesn’t elaborate, and Keith ponders the observation. Nothing out of the ordinary comes to mind.

“So?” He questions. Big deal, they’d been on the planet for a few days now. Longer, if Keith has been out for an entire week.

“So,” Lance enunciates, like Keith is dense, “Why would she be surprised to see me? We’re supposed to be here helping her people. It makes no sense that when I came running down the hall covered in your blood shouting for help, she seemed more surprised to see me at all than she was to see me covered in blood.” Lance fidgets with the hem of his shirt, pulling on a loose thread. “Maybe it’s nothing, but it struck me as weird.”

Keith considers it. The Avirans didn’t have any weapons. The queen knowingly sent them on a mission to get the weapons. When he and Lance arrived at the Galra ship, it was bigger than the queen had let on. Keith got shot, and apparently the queen seemed shocked to find Lance in her castle. “You think the queen sent us on purpose. That she intended for us not to come back.”

_Fuck this medication is strong. _

Lance meets his eyes but doesn’t say anything. It’s answer enough. Well, if it’s true, that would certainly put a damper on their ability to protect the civilians. It doesn’t make any sense though. What does the queen have to gain by killing two paladins of Voltron?

“We’ll have to watch her.” The words are difficult to get out. He is feeling good. Really good. He can’t feel the wound at all, and any of his normal aches and pains are forgotten too. He makes a small noise that has Lance looking at him with wide eyes.

“You okay over there, Mr. Mullet?” Lance questions, tone painfully even.

Keith grins back at him. “Mmhmm.” He lets his eyes fall shut. He doesn’t want to look at Lance anymore, his face is distracting him from thinking about the problem with the queen.

“Don’ give her the weapons. Hold onto ‘em if she asks for them.” His words come out a little slurred and he wonders what the fuck kind of painkillers the Avirans have given him.

“Okay. I think you should go to sleep.” Lance sounds amused, but fond. It has Keith struggling to open his eyelids so he can watch Lance smile at him. “I’ll be here when you wake up.” Keith nods his head.

“’m sorry.” Keith mumbles out, feeling a sudden urge to let Lance know before he goes to sleep that he’d never intended to scare him. He’d already said it, but it doesn’t feel like enough. Lance needs to know.

“I know. It’s okay. You didn’t mean to get shot.” Lance reaches out a hand and brushes the hair out of Keith’s eyes. It’s gentle, and it has Keith’s eyes closing again. He falls asleep to the feeling of Lance’s fingers in his hair.

* * *

The next time he wakes up, there’s a second pudding just for him. It’s not quite the same as it is on Earth, but it’s still pretty good. He likes that Lance remembered he wanted some.

It’s pretty early in the morning, his sleeping schedule apparently pretty close to what it should be. He needs to shower, his hair is a nasty greasy mess, but doesn’t think he can stand that long. Lance is currently in the shower, having left Keith to lay in bed with a book. It’s not like he can go anywhere. Their training plans with the Avirans are on hold until Keith can stand on his own again. It makes him anxious to wait, the Galra could arrive at any minute, but it’s a necessary torture. Lance comes out of the bathroom in their typical Aviran attire, hair wet.

“Can you wash my hair in the tub?” It’s an easy request, but it’s still hard for him to admit he needs help. He should be used to it around Lance with how they’ve been getting along lately, but it still causes him to hesitate. He thinks they can do it if Lance helps him into the tub and he lays flat enough.

Lance smirks at him. “You want me to wash the mullet?” It’s a rhetorical question, and Keith just waits for the rest of the teasing that always accompanies the topic of his hair. “Can I cut it if I wash it? We better not, it’s a part of your identity now.”

“Hilarious.” He deadpans, turning his head to watch Lance walk over to the bed to help him up. Lance sticks his arms under Keith’s armpits to support him as Keith gently puts his feet on the floor. It pulls on his wound just a little and he grits his teeth. Eventually, they get him standing with Lance taking most of his weight.

It’s a slow walk to the bathroom, Keith leaning almost fully on Lance. They get to the tub and they stand there for a few minutes as they figure out the logistics of having to get an injured person in the tub. Keith takes off his shirt and pants, but leaves his boxers on. Lance has to help him out of both and Keith pretends he doesn’t see the red on Lance’s cheeks. He owes him one, after getting shot and bleeding in his lion. Finally, he ends up propped in the tub at an angle that doesn’t agitate the injury, and Lance turns the water on to a temperature that’s comfortable.

It’s peaceful, if not a little awkward. Naturally, Lance talks to fill the silence. “I think you should call Shiro and tell him about getting shot. You could have died and it’s probably good that he knows we might need backup if the Galra arrive before we can get Red back.” It’s a little bit of a ramble, but Keith lets him say his piece. It doesn’t irritate him like it used to.

_It’s nice when he talks. He’s thoughtful._

“I don’t know how we’re going to get Red back.” He admits, tilting his head a little bit so the soap from the shampoo doesn’t get in his eyes. Lance’s fingers massage into his scalp as he thinks it over. They’re pretty much fucked. They can’t get Red back with just the two of them.

Lance seems to be on the same page. “We’ll have to wait for her to break out of the Galra ship. Still, you really should tell Shiro.” Lance sounds like a parent giving a lecture to their annoyed teenager, but he knows he’s right. Doesn’t mean he’s going to listen.

“Yeah, no. I’m going to wait until I’m better.” Keith disagrees. “If I tell him now it will just stress him out. He’ll worry needlessly.” One of the things that Keith hates most in life is watching Shiro worry. It’s hard to watch him be uneasy, and Keith thinks that Shiro has earned some damn peace. His injury can wait.

Lance’s silence is telling, and Keith waits for another push to tell Shiro but it doesn’t come. It’s tense in the room now, and he isn’t quite sure why. He doesn’t have the energy to deal with it though, and lets it be. Lance finishes washing and rinsing his hair and gives Keith the go ahead that he’s done.

He gets helped out of the bath and Lance leaves him alone to use the bathroom and pull on new underwear. Keith has to lean his full weight against the sink on his good side, but it’s worth it for the few minutes he gets to himself. He gets the sense that he’s upset Lance somehow. He replays his own words in his head but inspiration doesn’t strike. He calls Lance back in the room to help him with his pants and shirt before Lance is wrangling Keith back into the bed.

“I’m going to go find some more food.” Lance takes a few steps toward the door, and while the words were soft spoken and not unkind, Keith senses anger in them. Keith just nods his head. He’s not going to go along with Lance’s middle school drama bullshit. If he has a problem, he can tell Keith himself. The door clicks shut behind Lance and Keith is left by himself with The Odyssey copy he’d found. Maybe he’d get a little rest.

* * *

He’s fully invested in the story, questioning just how dumb the suitors are that they think it takes that fucking long to weave a shroud, when there’s a quiet knock on the door. “Come in.” Lance wouldn’t have knocked, and Keith isn’t expecting anyone. The queen herself glides into the room, polite smile firmly fixed in place. Her dress, pastel green to match Aviran sand, trails in behind her before she shuts the door. She’s alone, neither of the two guards this castle has accompanying her.

“You’re looking much better. Not so pale and lifeless.” The queen observes, eyes slowly raking over Keith’s form. He fights the urge to cross his arms, keeping them firmly on either side of the book he’s holding. Yesterday’s conversation with Lance flashes like an alarm in his head, and he’s on the defense. If Lance felt weird vibes, Keith is definitely suspicious of the queen.

“Yeah well,” He quips drily, “I’m sure it helps that they patched the hole in my abdomen.” He watches her face closely, searching for any sign that she has impure intentions. She’s watching him back; his gut knows it. The mask stays in place.

“I’m sure it does.” She doesn’t sound so happy about that, and Keith is glad he lived just to spite her. “It would be a tragedy had such a young paladin of Voltron fallen.” Keith doesn’t get what she’d doing here. Surely, she’s got better things to do than come in here and prod at his temper.

The queen moves to take the chair next to his bed--

_That’s Lance’s chair_

\--and she sits down gracefully, folding her four hands in her lap delicately. Her eyes rove over his face for a few moments before she seems to decide on something. “Tell me, how _did_ you escape.” And there it is. Keith knows Lance is right. The queen fucking planned for them to die. Her voice is too sugary sweet, the concern laid on too thick. It’s so obvious that Keith thinks maybe she _wants_ him to know he knows. His gut is yelling at him that she’s dangerous.

“Oh, you know, just lucky I guess.” Inspiration suddenly strikes him and he just knows Pidge would be so fucking proud of him for what he says next. “I mean, there were only a couple of Galra foot soldiers there, just two or three, so really it’s my fault I got shot. Just a dumb mistake. I’m lucky Lance was there.”

He sees exactly what he wants to see. Confusion lights the queen’s face before it’s replaced by fake sympathy. Lance is right, the evidence is in the reaction. The queen is confused as to why there were so few guards. If she planned to have Keith and Lance killed then logically, she planned to have enough guards to overpower them, not two or three. Their eyes meet and Keith hopes his mask is as convincing as hers.

The door swings open and Lance walks through, a plate in each hand piled high with meat and vegetables of some kind. He stops part of the way into the room when he notices that Keith has company. Lance’s eyes widen a little before false excitement takes over.

_Lance you’re smooth as shit, buddy._

“Your majesty, it’s so good to see you. Sorry the last time was so stressful.” Lance sets the plates down on the end table next to the bed, coming to stand next to Keith. He’s on the opposite side of the bed and Keith feels a little caught in the middle. They don’t look at each other, Lance just keeps up his caregiver bouncy charade and makes a show of looking at Keith’s bandages.

The queen watches him for a moment, eyes flicking to Keith before returning to Lance’s face. “It’s no problem, I assure you. I was just telling Keith how incredibly lucky your escape from the clutches of the Galra was.” It’s a smoother lie this time around, a combination of practice and the queen’s lady boner for Lance making it come out easier.

“It was lucky. I’m glad he’s okay.” Lance sticks his bandage back down and hands Keith his plate of food.

The three of them hold the silence until the queen stands, long frame standing tall. “Well, I’m afraid I must get back to my duties. I’m looking forward to when you get back on your feet.” It sounds like she wishes he would suffocate in his sleep and die, but the smile she gives him could be on a toothpaste commercial.

“Me too.” Her grin fades as she exits the room, the door closing softly behind her. They wait a few moments until the sound of her shoes on the floor can no longer be heard. Lance turns to look at him, one hand on his hip.

“I leave you alone for half an hour and I come back to a level of drama and snark that Grey’s Anatomy wishes it had.” He quips, exasperated. Keith lets out a chuckle, bringing his hands up in a shrug.

“Hey, I’m not the one planning other people’s murder.” He takes a bite of his vegetables, he’s starving, before he re hashes what Lance missed. “You’re right. She definitely wanted us to go down on that ship. I lied and told her there were only a couple of guards and it confused her.”

Lance looks shocked despite the accusation being his to begin with. He rounds the bed to sit down in his usual chair. He chews a piece of meat meticulously while he processes the words. “If she wanted us dead there would be more than a couple.” Lance agrees.

Keith silently agrees, fork scraping along his plate. Lance scrubs a hand over his eyes, before speaking again. “What do we do now?” That always seems to be the question. What _do_ they do now.

Keith lays it out for himself. They’re missing a lion, he’s got a wound from being shot, they’re missing half the team so they can’t form Voltron, they only got half the number of weapons they were supposed to steal. He misses back when the worst problem he had was having nightmares about a certain blue-eyed paladin. He sighs.

“Our job.” As much as everything sucks right now, he’s never been a quitter. “We wait for me to heal a little and then we train the Avirans to fight. We figure out what the queen is up to, and we kick some Galra ass and get Red back.” It sounds easy when he lists it out like that. It sounds doable. When he turns his head to glance at Lance when he doesn’t reply, he finds him staring at him with a small smile. He looks determined.

“Alright then. I trust you.” It’s matter of fact, and Lance turns back to his plate.

Keith knows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been so long, university is kicking my ass. Hope you enjoyed the chapter, there's plenty more to come!


	4. Not Bad at All

Being forced into bed rest for the next several days really tries Keith’s patience. It’s never been his strong suit on a good day, patience is something he actively has to work toward, and it’s certainly been an act of God that he hasn’t snapped. He’s now on the fourth day since he woke up, so he’s had a total of eleven days of rest. That’s fucking plenty enough for him. Not for Lance though.

Keith just wants to stretch his legs. Lance has gone to make a quick loop around the castle and the town to be seen by the Aviran citizens. They don’t want to cause a panic by being overly absent, and Lance has been the one to go out and chat and learn information while Keith heals. Keith doesn’t know when he’ll be back, but he can’t sit here anymore.

He stands, slowly sliding out of the bed and using Lance’s chair to support his weight while he straightens out. It doesn’t hurt so much anymore; the wound has had enough time to heal that he can twist his side a little. He takes a few relieved steps around the room before making his way to the bathroom to brush his teeth. It’s amazing, both the independence and clean teeth. He wipes his mouth and returns to the main room. He goes to look out the window, moving the thin lace curtains out of the way. He can’t see much, just the pastel green sand and a few buildings dotted here and there. There are a few people out and about.

“What are you doing?” Lance’s voice sounds a little panicked and Keith turns around to see him taking quick steps toward his spot at the window. Keith must have missed Lance’s quiet entrance into the room.

Keith shrugs. “I couldn’t lay in bed anymore. I’m fine enough to get up and move around. I think we should start training tomorrow.” He’s not in good enough shape to do hand to hand, but they can teach the Avirans to use the Galran weapons they stole. Lance’s mouth twists down into a frown.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea. You got shot, Keith.” He says it like Keith isn’t perfectly aware of that fact. Lance comes to a stop next to him, glancing out the window, presumably to find whatever Keith is looking at. He gives Keith a look when he finds nothing of interest.

Keith rolls his eyes. “Yeah, but I’m good to go now. At least good enough to do weapons training. I won’t have to agitate the wound at all for that.” It’s a good argument, the fact that Keith is standing here right now having a conversation is proof enough to him that he doesn’t need to be restrained to the bed. Lance doesn’t look convinced, and Keith tries to compromise. “Look, if I get tired, I’ll just sit and watch. You’re perfectly capable of teaching them to shoot.”

_More capable than me to begin with, he’s the sharpshooter. _

It seems to do its job and Lance lets out a sigh. “Fine. I’ll go out into the town and let the civilians know we’re going to start training for anyone who wants it.” Lance leaves the window to opt for a spot at their little table, pulling out a chair. It reminds Keith of their first few days on the planet, and he’s happy they’re getting back on schedule.

“We need somewhere to train them. We can’t exactly go shooting a bunch of weapons in the middle of town.” Keith points out, pulling out his own chair at the table, legs scraping against the floor. “Also, if the queen is trying to kill us, it stands to reason that she doesn’t actually want us training the people. I think we should try to keep it on the down low.”

Lance leans back in his chair and brings a hand up to rub his eyes. He looks a little run down and Keith knows that the past few days have been hard on him. He’s had to be Keith’s personal servant for food, and trips to the bathroom, and anything else he might need. Lance has really had his back and has been everything a paladin of Voltron should be. He also knows Lance has been worrying over his wound, checking it more times in a day than Keith thinks is strictly necessary.

“When I go to spread the news, I’ll try and find a location and I’ll tell everyone to keep the meeting secret just in case the Galra have an inside man. It might cause concern, but it’s better than the queen shutting the entire thing down.” It’s a well-rounded plan, and Keith feels guilty that Lance has to go alone. He should be out there with him dealing with wrangling up the Avirans and organizing weapons training.

Keith reaches out to nudge Lance in the shoulder. “Go take a nap. I’m not going to die, and you need the rest.” Lance rolls his eyes and doesn’t move, opting instead to fold his arms on the table and rest his chin on them. He meets Keith’s eyes and gives him a look that reads _I’m not the one that got shot, you go take a nap._

Keith stands up from the table and takes a step into Lance’s space, pulling on his arm. He’s warm from being outside. “Get up, you’re going to take a nap.”

Lance shakes him off. “Uh, no I’m not. You should use today to get more rest, you’re going to need it tomorrow if you’re going to be on your feet.” He looks away from Keith in dismissal, resting his head back down on his arms.

Keith pauses for a second to get his temper under control.

_Just let me take care of you too, damn it._

“Okay, get up,” Keith pulls on Lance’s arm again, a little harder this time around, “We’re both going to take a nap. Nobody’s getting out of bed until dinner, we both need to rest, and I’m tired of you walking around looking like a ghost.”

Lance hesitates before relenting, rising from his place at the table to follow Keith over to the bed. He hovers over Keith like a mother hen while he gets in on his side, holding a hand out to help him in that Keith ignores. Once Keith is situated, Lance rounds the bed to get in on his side, switching off the lamp on the side table. It’s still too bright in the room with the light from the window, but it’s quiet and relaxed, the late afternoon sun causing the room to be warm and cozy rather than blinding.

Keith can’t believe he’s back in the bed fifteen minutes after tasting freedom, but it’s worth it for the way he can see Lance getting comfortable out of the corner of his eye. He can tell that Lance is trying to stay awake and he has to keep himself from rolling his eyes lest he be caught staring. He’s on his side facing Keith, his hair already a mess, and he’s blinking his eyes like it requires his focus to keep them open. Keith silently questions what he’s waiting for when it occurs to him. Keith rolls his head to the side to face Lance and closes his eyes as he gets comfortable, angling himself so Lance can see he’s asleep. He waits a few minutes before he squints one eye open. Lance is lights out, and Keith pulls the blanket a little higher over them both.

When Keith wakes up, Lance isn’t in the bed anymore, he can tell before he opens his eyes. When he does open his eyes, something is stuck to his forehead and obscuring his vision. Confused, he brings a hand up to unstick what turns out to be a handwritten note from Lance on a small piece of torn paper. Where in the world Lance found scratch paper, he doesn’t know.

He reads it out loud. “Keith, went to run the errands for tomorrow’s training and didn’t want to wake you.” There’s a little ‘L’ under the message and Keith runs his thumb over Lance’s neat handwriting. It’s almost feminine the little letters are scratched out so gracefully, nothing like his own chicken scratch.

Once again, he feels bad that Lance has to do all the work. He’s itching for tomorrow’s training so he can stand equally by Lance’s side again. They’re better as a team, no matter how incredibly capable Lance is. If this experience has shown Keith anything, it’s how much underestimating he’s done of Lance, in all things. In fact, Keith has found he admires many things about Lance.

He falls back asleep with the note still in his hand.

* * *

Keith gets to shower like a normal person the next morning, and it almost brings tears of joy. Having to stretch his arms up to wash his hair pulls only the tiniest bit on his gauze covered wound, but it still burns. It’s worth it. He bumps into Lance as soon as he tries to leave the bathroom and he doesn’t comment on the fact that Lance must have been standing there to listen for him falling in the shower. The concern is both endearing and irritating, but he feels like he still owes Lance for getting shot and lets him do it.

Keith replaces the wet bandaging, smearing an ointment meant to keep the injury clean on his wound, and tapes down the new gauze. Lance watches the entire process through the mirror in the bathroom under the pretense of brushing his teeth. He only shuts the door to the bathroom to shower when Keith moves to pull his shirt over his head. When he replays the scene in his mind he can’t help but note that Lance’s eyes had been looking at his chest and not his wound.

Once they’re both clean and ready for the day, they leave the room to get breakfast from the kitchen. Keith hasn’t left the room since the day of the mission to get the weapons, and it feels incredible not to be cooped up anymore. Nothing seems to be different about the castle. The atmosphere is still the same. The castle’s two guards wave at them as they pass. It seems only him and Lance feel any kind of trepidation in the queen’s castle.

They enter the kitchen. The cooks’ pots and pans are spread out over the stove while the staff starts on preparing lunch despite the fact that breakfast has just been served. There’s a quiet hum of hustle and bustle that prevents them from gaining any real attention as they gather plates with exotic fruits and something that could be oatmeal. They eat it leaning over a counter that’s out of the way enough they can hear each other easily. Lance is practically vibrating in excitement over something as he shoves a not grape in his mouth. The fruit has become a staple in their diets here.

“Did you get my note?” Lance questions, stirring his oatmeal to mix in the sugar-like substance one of the cooks had given him. His tone is light, clearly he knows Keith read the note, and Keith can’t help but be amused by the question.

Keith does his best to keep his tone from being so fond. “Why yes, Lance, I did. It was kind of hard to miss.” Lance’s laughter at his short response brings a smile to his face. “Did you find a place to train?” 

Lance tastes his oatmeal creation and makes a face, cringing as he sticks the spoon back in the bowl and pushes it away. “I did, actually. You’re going to be impressed by it.” Lance sounds proud of himself, standing a little taller. “I mean, of course I found the best spot.”

Keith shoves him lightly, smirking when Lance has to catch the edge of the counter. “So? Where is it?” He takes a bite of his own oatmeal and thinks Lance’s reaction was a little uncalled for. It’s not that bad. He shrugs and takes another bite.

Lance watches him eat the food, a look of mild disgust on his face. “There’s an abandoned building at the edge of the city that isn’t used anymore. It’s huge, and the main floor is just empty space.” He does his best to paint a picture for Keith, raising his hands to try and lay it out in the air so Keith can get a better idea of what they have to work with. “I also thought we could use the empty crates from the Galra guns as targets.”

Keith actually is impressed. It sounds like exactly what they need and he knows it must not have been easy to find. “Did you come back to sleep last night after you left the note?”

Lance fidgets next to him, looking down at the marble design in the counter. “No, but I’m good.” It sounds like a lie, his voice is too even and the smudges under his eyes speak for themselves. He perks back up again after a moment. “Wow, Lance, you’re incredible. I can’t believe you’ve worked so hard to support the Avirans, it’s only a matter of time until they throw you a parade—” He cuts off when Keith puts a hand over his mouth. Lance’s eyes are squinty from smiling at him where they peek over his palm.

“First off,” Keith starts, exasperated, “I _am_ impressed. You’ve done great these last couple of days to make sure everything goes as planned.” He removes his hand from Lance’s face. Lance isn’t smiling anymore, instead he’s back to staring at the counter. Keith almost asks him if he’s okay but then he catches sight of the red dusting Lance’s cheeks. He grins. “You’ve taken good care of me.”

Lance squawks, turning away and coughing into his arm. Keith laughs at him, he can’t help it, and Lance takes his turn to shove him lightly. Keith half-heartedly holds his hands up in defense. “Second of all,” Keith continues, “You need to sleep. You can’t keep going on like this. Tonight, you’re sleeping in the bed and you’re not getting up again.” He leaves no room for argument. Lance just nods his head, cheeks still red.

They finish their breakfast, and Lance tells him that he’d told the Aviran citizens that training would start a little before lunch and that they should head for the building. They don’t pass anyone on their way out of the castle. It makes him uneasy that the queen hasn’t made an appearance since that day in their room. Radio silence is usually worse than any kind of overt attack.

Keith blinks into the sun as the heavy castle doors swing shut behind them. He has to squint when the sun reflects off the pastel green sand and follows behind Lance. They pass the tent-like buildings they’d seen upon arrival, and Keith is still awed by the way the glass shards shine and project colors onto the sand where the sun shines through them. There’s more people out now. It had been like a ghost town when they’d first arrived but now the city is active with Avirans buying things at the market and going about their day. As far as he knows the planet is still on high alert for a Galra invasion and the people should be taking shelter. He debates whether the Avirans have gotten used to the threat of danger or if they’ve been told it’s okay to come out. He’s deep in his thoughts when Lance comes to a stop and Keith almost runs into him.

Lance has brought them to an incredibly large building. It’s almost bigger than the castle. It looks like all of the others in town except that it looks somewhat run down. There are glass shards missing out of the walls with little holes left behind in the structure. The building has sand piled up against the side of it where no one has bothered to clear it away. Keith wonders why this building isn’t in use anymore. They’re on the edge of town, but still close enough to the marketplace that it feels purposeful that this building isn’t being used. It’s weird.

Lance shoves the door open and Keith follows him in. The inside of the building is completely clear, like the floor of a storage unit would be. There’s no décor on the walls, no furniture. Just the walls, floor, and ceiling. At the far end of the room Keith can see the empty crates that Lance has set up to be the practice targets, the guns themselves lined neatly against the wall. They’re all in a line, equal distance apart, and stretch the width of the room. All in all, it looks perfect for what they want to use the building for. Also, there’s about thirty Avirans quietly chatting amongst themselves where they sit against the wall. Keith’s heart drops. 

“This is it? Out of everyone?” Lance asks, taking the question right out of Keith’s mouth. The Avirans look around at each other. It’s such a small group. Teaching only thirty civilians won’t do much good against an entire Galra fleet.

One woman stands up from her place on the floor. She’s tall, like all Avirans, but she’s dressed simply. “Our people are not fighters. The idea of having to fight against the Galra has kept many away.” She sounds apologetic and Keith feels bad for her. The Avirans never asked for this.

This has put them in a tight spot. Keith had been hoping for a better turn out. One look at Lance tells him he’d been hoping too. Thirty newly trained Avirans and one functional lion won’t last long in a fight with the Galra. He takes a minute to consider their options. He turns to Lance again. They make quiet eye contact, Lance giving a resigned shrug, and Keith sighs.

Keith has never been very inspirational. He wishes that Shiro was here. The thought sends a pang through his chest, he misses him so much. Shiro always knows what to say.

Keith takes a few steps towards the little group of Avirans, coming to a stop in front of them. He stalls for time, running a hand through his hair while he comes up with something remotely appropriate to say to these people. “Look,” He raises his voice to be heard, “I know that you’re all afraid of the Galra. I am too.” He pauses and Lance gives him an encouraging nod.

He clears his throat and starts again. “The fact that you’re here now shows that you’re not willing to just lay down and let them take your home. We’re going to do our best to teach you, but when the time comes you’ll never be completely ready.” He’s rambling, and he knows it. “Just…don’t give up. Remember what you’re fighting for.”

_And remember that patience yields focus._

His words echo in the large and empty space and he stands there awkwardly while the others absorb his impromptu introduction-made-speech. Lance joins him, a quiet source of support next to him.

The Avirans whisper amongst each other for a few moments before the woman from earlier speaks up again. “So, where do we start?”

* * *

Twenty minutes later, Lance has the civilians broken up into two groups to practice shooting and holding a gun. Keith has chosen to take a break and lean against the far right wall to rest his wound. He’s got a perfect vantage point to watch Lance work. He’s professional, walking down the line of Avirans to adjust their stance and give kind words of encouragement. He tells them not to be afraid and Keith honestly could kiss him.

_What?_

The thought comes out of nowhere and Keith sucks in a breath. As unexpected as the thought is, he finds that it’s true. He really does want to kiss Lance. And just like all the times before now, he still doesn’t feel weird about having these kinds of thoughts about Lance. The more he thinks about it, the more he realizes he’s kind of always wanted to kiss him. He remembers how he’d dismissed his attraction to Lance as a universal phenomenon and thinks that maybe he’d jumped the gun on that one. Maybe it’s just Keith.

The thing is, the more Keith thinks about kissing Lance, the more he realizes that he actually _likes_ Lance. For all the shit Keith gives him, he’s never once thought that Lance was actually as dumb or as annoying as he’d said he was. And wasn’t Keith just last night thinking about how much he admired Lance and then telling him how impressed he was by him this morning? Oh fuck. He _likes _Lance.

_You have it bad._

And just like that, Keith’s entire perspective on a certain blue-eyed boy becomes a lot clearer. Everything just makes more sense now, and honestly? Keith is relieved.

The sound of fifteen Galra weapons going off at once startles him out of his thoughts. He brings his focus back to the shooting line and watches the Avirans do their best to shoot holes in the crates. It’s rocky, with only a few hits, but it’s a start. Lance watches over all of them like he’s proud of them, standing off to the side with a small smile on his face and standing tall. He’s gorgeous.

“Hey Mullet,” Lance calls across the room, “Not bad, right?” He’s grinning, hands splayed wide as he gestures to the Avirans, who are clearly embarrassed by the small amount of praise.

“Not bad.” He calls back, grinning.

Not bad at all.

* * *

Once they dismiss training for the day, Keith tells Lance that he’s going to go clean the inside of Blue and update Shiro on all the shit that’s happened. He leaves out his breakthrough about his feelings.

“Are you sure you want to do that?” Lance questions. He doesn’t want Keith to go alone, Keith knows.He shrugs dismissively. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. I’ll come back if I get too tired.” They both know he’s full of shit, but Lance just fidgets for a moment before he sighs, waving Keith off. Neither of them addresses the blood he’ll find inside of Blue. Keith gives him a tiny smile before they part ways, Keith for the lion and Lance back to the castle.

After he does get to Blue, he’s presented with an unforeseen problem.

“I know you don’t like me very much right now, but I promise I didn’t mean to bleed all over you.” Keith apologizes awkwardly. He’s stood in front of Blue, hands on his hips as he tilts his head back to look up at her face. He’s glad he came alone; he’d never live this down.

Blue doesn’t react at all. “Blue,” he tries to keep the irritation out of his voice, “I need to call Shiro and clean the blood.” He stands there while the sun beats down on him. It’s warm and he’s impatient. Suddenly, he feels something nudging at the edge of his mind, just a prod of something like fear and affection that isn’t his own.

It clicks for him what she wants. “I’m really sorry I scared him, Blue.” He’s genuine in his apology. Of course, this is what Blue wants, she’s Lance’s lion and therefore knows what he’d gone through that day. “I was stubborn and got hurt and he was there for me. I’m really sorry.”

Blue’s mouth opens for him after a moment. He climbs into the cockpit, running a hand along the wall as he does in thanks, and stops short at the image the inside of Blue makes. His own blood is all over the floor behind the captain’s chair. He doesn’t know how he didn’t bleed out, there’s so much. He thinks that if the situation were reversed and it had been Lance that had gotten shot he wouldn’t be able to fly knowing this amount of blood was coming from him.

He takes a deep breath and goes in search of a mop or something to clean with. Blue directs him to a small bin in the storage compartment and he finds chemicals to clean with. It takes a while to get the blood up, but when he does it looks like nothing ever happened. He’s glad to put the moment behind him.

Finally, he plops down in the captain’s chair. It feels weird, Blue is not his lion and he doesn’t have a bond with her. There’s none of the usual affection and sass Red has for him. It’s just empty. Blue pulls up Shiro’s video comm anyway and he thanks her. He waits while it connects and he realizes that he still hasn’t told Shiro about getting shot.

“Keith, it’s been over a week. Are you okay?” Shiro is automatically concerned and Keith is guilty for prolonging this. He would want to know if Shiro or one of the others was hurt.

Keith starts off slowly and calmly. “So, I know you’re going to be mad, but just hear me out.” He feels it’s better to warn Shiro. Keith is no stranger to fucking up and he knows the best combination to earn Shiro’s forgiveness. “I got shot. I’m better now! I’m good. Walking and talking and all that.”

Shiro is worried anyways. He’s looking at Keith like he grew a second head and he’s paler than he was a second ago. He opens and closes his mouth a few times. “Let me see.” It’s an order, and Keith stands and lifts his shirt so Shiro can see the small circular wound at his waistline. It’s clearly healing and Shiro settles a little bit.

Now Shiro is mad. “Keith. Why didn’t you tell me sooner? Or Lance. Anyone at all.” There’s still concern laced in with the anger and Keith feels properly chastised with the guilt.

“I’ve been on bed rest and I didn’t want to add to Lance’s list of things he had to do.” No way was he going to ask Lance to be the one to tell Shiro that he got shot.

Shiro lets out a breath and leans back in his seat. The worst of it is over and Keith relaxes. They sit in the quiet for a moment, the quiet hum of static over the comm echoing in the background.

“Lance has been doing all the work. He’s figured everything out while I’ve just been laying in bed.” He isn’t quite sure why he says it. Keith has never been good at talking about his feelings and he knows that Shiro will read between the lines.

Shiro tilts his head in appraisal, looking at Keith’s face intently. He has to look away, down at his lap so that Shiro’s gaze isn’t quite so penetrating.

“You figured it out.” Shiro’s voice is sympathetic and kind. He sounds like he’s sharing a secret with Keith and not the other way around. He doesn't try to understand how it's possible Shiro already knows.

“Yeah.” He’s quiet. Shiro lets him think. “Today at weapon’s training for the Avirans. It just clicked into place.” He states it as a matter of fact, as if he’s just filling Shiro in on the events of the day.

Shiro smiles at him, loving and kind of grossly affectionate. He’s got that older brother vibe to him right now and Keith both loves and hates it. “Are you going to tell him?”

That stops him short. He had never even considered how Lance might feel about him. Sure, he’d gone above and beyond taking care of Keith these last few days, and they have been getting along better than ever, but that doesn’t exactly equate romantic feelings. Keith’s heart sinks and he feels kind of empty.

Shiro just watches him hash it out, only breaking the silence when it’s clear Keith isn’t going to give an answer. “He likes you too. He does.”

Keith doesn’t know what to think. Lance hasn’t exactly been coming on to him, but Keith could argue that his own behavior hasn’t been romantic in intention either. “I’m going to leave it alone for now.” It’s the safe bet. He’ll hold his peace until something comes to a head, for better or for worse.

_It will crush me if he doesn’t like me too._

The words go unsaid and Shiro takes pity on him and moves on. “So, you got shot. Is there anything else I should know?” His dry tone makes the corner of Keith’s mouth quirk up.

“Well,” Keith starts, “We’re pretty sure the queen tried to have me and Lance killed on a mission to retrieve weapons from a Galra ship. Also, the Galra have Red.” And fuck, he’d forgotten he hadn’t told Shiro about that either. He’s glad Shiro’s on a completely different planet because he looks like he wants to hit Keith upside the head. “So we’re watching her. And we’re going to get Red back somehow. We’ll let you know if anything else pops up.” He certainly hopes nothing else pops up.

It’s quiet while Shiro closes his eyes, presumably to avoid reaching through the screen to murder him. Keith is the one to break the silence this time. “What about you guys? Anything new?”

“No, Keith,” Shiro is so done with him, “_We _don’t have any updates because we actively try to not make stupid decisions.” And yeah, okay, Keith deserved that. “No, we’re fine. No need to worry.” Shiro softens his tone.

Keith is comforted by the fact that his little family is safe on their mission and it’s one less thing he has to worry about right now.

“I’m going to head back. Lance needs to sleep and he won’t unless I make him.” Keith is going to lose it if he goes back to find Lance out running some more errands.

“Mmhm.” Shiro agrees, a little amused. “Right. Tell him I said we’re glad he’s okay.” Keith knows that as soon as the group is back together Shiro is going to rib on him so bad about his feelings for Lance. “I’m glad you’re okay too, Keith. Don’t make any more dumb choices, just stay safe.”

“I’ll try.” It’s the best he can do and he gives Shiro a little wave as the comm disconnects.

* * *

Once he’s outside standing in the sand again, he only makes it a few steps in the direction of the castle before he’s turning back. He looks up at Blue. He closes the distance and puts one hand on her leg. “I’ll keep him safe too, don’t worry.”

Satisfied that maybe he’s said the right thing for once, he makes his way back to the castle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally! Feelings have been realized!


	5. Pass the guard

After he gets back to his and Lance’s room from his little heart to heart with Shiro, he finds Lance standing in front of their bed towel drying his hair. He has his pajamas on, and the warm glow from the lamp makes everything soft and comfortable. He must catch Keith out of the corner of his eye because he starts and then turns to face Keith more fully. He’s still flushed from the shower and Keith looks back at the door as he closes it, so he doesn’t look too closely.

_Does he flush like that when…?_

“Was it bad?” Lance doesn’t beat around the bush, but he sounds sympathetic. He drops the towel in their dirty laundry and plops onto the bed. He smears some kind of mystery cream he must have found in the bathroom onto his face, examining the jar with his one free hand as he does so. “What are the chances this is moisturizer? It’s got the same consistency.” He squints into the jar and then back at Keith like he would have any idea at all about alien moisturizer.

Keith toes out of his shoes and pulls up a chair next to the bed. “No, it was okay. He was mad at first, but mostly just concerned.” He watches Lance try to read alien writing on the packaging of the jar. “Maybe you just smeared lube on your face.” Keith doesn’t know why he says it, but he’s right. The mystery substance also has the same consistency as lube. He flounders awkwardly for a second while Lance just looks at him. It makes him flush a little to be talking about lube, even in a non-sexual circumstance. It hits too close to the topic of how he feels about Lance, like he just can’t say the word lube out loud while looking at him.

Lance, for his part, is just staring into the jar with the one hand that had previously been massaging the substance into his face paused on his cheek. “Then so be it.” Lance shrugs and switches to the other side of his face. It makes Keith laugh out loud, genuinely, and Lance grins at him while he does. Keith suspects that had been the intention. They let the lightness of the moment hang in the air for a few moments while Lance finishes and runs a hand through his damp hair.

“Are the others doing good?” Lance questions, pulling his legs up onto the bed so he can sit cross legged. Keith wants to smack himself, of course Lance would want to know. He should have filled him in to start with.

Keith is quick to answer. “Yeah. Yes, they’re fine.” He sticks out his legs and crosses them at the ankles. “They said to tell you that they’re glad you’re okay.” Lance smiles, but it’s not very warm. He looks a little bit sad. Keith wonders if Lance is homesick right now for the others. God knows Keith is. He stands up under the pretense of going to take a shower. He can’t quite help it when he sticks a hand out and runs it through Lance’s hair as he passes him, pushing his bangs back. “We’ll see them again soon. Just a few more days I’m sure.” Keith tries his best to be comforting. It must work because Lance leans into his touch for the few moments it’s there. The smile Lance gives him this time is genuine.

They go to sleep early, and sleep without any nightmares.

* * *

The next day is spent continuing to train the Avirans. Keith and Lance show up early to get everything set up again. Lance walks around the big open space, propping the crates up as he goes. Keith goes to the other side of the room and rolls out the mats he’d found in a small shed behind the building. They’re not very thick, and they’re dusty, but they’ll get the job done. Keith doesn’t know what their original purpose was since the Avirans aren’t fighters. Maybe they just practice really intense yoga? It just makes the purpose of the building more ominous.

He’s torn from his thoughts when Lance fires one of the weapons, testing the range. The sound echoes in their surroundings, but Lance looks satisfied with the shot. The Avirans are trickling in now a few at a time. Keith goes to stand where they had all met yesterday and Lance joins him. Lance chats quietly with the Avirans while they wait for the others. Keith is relieved when everyone shows up. They have no newcomers, but nobody has abandoned them yet either. He’ll consider it a win.

The plan for today is different than yesterday’s. On the walk over, Keith had finally won the ‘you’re too injured’ argument by emphasizing the pressing need that was the imminent Galra arrival. Maybe it was a little unfair, Lance was well aware, but it was true. As a result, a new plan was hashed out. The first half of training would be spent with Lance continuing to teach weapons and the second half Keith would teach hand to hand combat.

After a quick explanation to the Avirans and pause for questions, Lance leads the group over to the firing line. Keith hangs around closer than yesterday, hovering next to the pile of weapons. He makes himself busy with handing out a Galra gun to everyone before moving to lean against the wall. He takes a breath and prepares himself to watch Lance teach.

“Okay everybody, today is just like yesterday.” Lance speaks loudly to be heard in the large space, walking down the row of impromptu soliders. “Remember the stance from yesterday and practice that, remember form is more important in the beginning than trying to hit a bullseye.” He pauses and Keith figures he’s waiting for questions. “If you need help just ask.” In dismissal, Lance heads over to Keith.

Lance keeps a close eye on his students while he leans next to Keith, eyes roaming over everyone’s stance and then the target. Keith watches Lance with rapt attention, Lance’s confidence and ability making warmth settle in his gut.

“—today?” Lance is asking him a question, but Keith didn’t catch any of it. He’s looking directly at Lance, and so it’s more than a little embarrassing. Keith clears his throat.

_Good one, dumbass._

“What?” Keith asks dumbly, focusing again. He fights against the flush rising in his cheeks when he realizes he’d been mooning over Lance.

Lance is looking at him in confusion, eyebrows scrunched up and a look like _hey dummy you_ _okay_ in his eyes. “I said, I know I’m not the best but I know some things. Do you want me to be your partner when you teach hand to hand today?” He says it slower than he would normally and Keith rolls his eyes.

Keith doesn’t think about it too hard. Some help would be nice. It’s not like Lance is terrible at hand to hand, Keith is just better is all. He shrugs. “Yeah, that sounds good.”

Lance gives him a nod but then breaks away from the wall to go attend to one of the Avirans.

It’s not until they’re actually demonstrating hand to hand combat that Keith starts to think that taking Lance’s offer was a mistake.

“In order to teach you some basic hand to hand moves, I’m going to need you all to partner up.” It’s still awkward for Keith to be teaching like this, usually it’s Shiro’s area of expertise, but he does his best. The Avirans only shuffle around for a moment before they’re all standing in front of him and Lance next to their partners.

As they stretch, Keith tries to explain what they’re going to learn. “So, what’s really important for hand to hand combat is that you use your weight and balance correctly.” Keith scrambles as he tries to put all of his years of fighting down to the most basic necessities. “And just realize that you need to practice like it’s a real fight. It’s easy to let your partner get away with getting the technique exactly right when you know that they’re trying to learn, but that’s not the way to help them.” He’s almost quoting something Shiro had said to them once, and he can see Lance nodding quietly to himself as he listens. “So practice like it’s real. Because someday soon it will be.” It’s a little heavy handed, but it’s true. They need to remember why they’re here.

After they finish with their stretches, touching their toes and so on, it’s time to demonstrate the first move. Keith settles on guard position. It’s simple and useful for a lot of harder techniques. This is where shit hits the fan.

Lance scoots across the mat toward him and asks him “Do you want to demonstrate the move or how to get out of it?” Keith lets the mental image of the move flash in his mind. To be in guard in self-defense means wrapping your legs around your opponents waist and locking your feet together. He’s bombarded with images of both his legs around Lance’s waist and Lance’s around his.

Now is not the time to be thinking about this, and so he just spits out an answer. “I’ll break out of guard.” Keith is panicking and he feels stupid. He’s fought with Lance on the training deck so many times before now, it shouldn’t be any different this time. But it is, it’s a lot different when Keith knows how he feels about Lance.

“Okay.” Lance replies easily and gets up on his knees, balancing his weight between them like he would if he was getting ready for Keith to attack him.

Keith takes a breath. “Lance is going to show what guard looks like when you are already on the ground, because most fights end up on the ground anyway, and I will demonstrate how to get out of it. The goal is to break their legs apart so you can pass the guard.” His tone is level as he speaks to their Aviran students, and he’s so _so_ grateful that he at least looks put together on the outside.

Keith takes another breath before he gets up on his knees, mirroring Lance. There’s a beat and then Keith is on him. He goes like he wants to straddle Lance, like he really would in a fight to hold him down, and Lance leans with it so he can get a leg on either side of Keith’s hips. Lance locks his feet together around Keith’s waist, pulling them flush together.

Keith regrets taking Lance’s offer of help. They’re too close together like this, it’s too close to what they’d look like in _other _situations. They’re breathing hard from struggling against each other and Keith is leaning over Lance low. He’s being heavy on purpose, leaning so their chests are touching and faces close so Lance can’t flip them as easy. They’re touching all the way down and it’s too much for Keith. He keeps from touching Lance on purpose on any other day and suddenly everything he want is pinned beneath him. Lance’s lips are inches from his own. Lance is gazing up at him from beneath him, a flush rising in his cheeks. Keith doesn’t know why Lance is blushing, they’ve done this before.

The answer never comes, and Keith knows they’re taking too long to break apart. Keith should be demonstrating how to pass the guard. He takes one more look at Lance, his pupils are wide and he’s still breathing harder than he should be, before digging an elbow into Lance’s knees to break his legs apart. As fast as he can, Keith shoves one of his legs over Lance’s so that he can fall into guard when Lance starts to sit up. Now their positions have swapped and Keith needs to be anywhere else.

Keith lets Lance go only after a couple of seconds and scoots back to put some room between them. He smoothes a hand through his hair in a nervous tick he knows he has and clears his throat. He puts on a smidge of professionalism and turns to the Avirans who are watching them closely, eyes flicking between him and Lance.

“So that’s guard. Any questions?” He’s relieved when there are none. He dismisses them to try on their own and stands up quickly. He speed walks to the door of the training building, grimacing when his footsteps are loud on the stone floor. He needs to get air.

“Keith?” Lance calls after him and he can hear concern and confusion lacing his voice. Keith doesn’t answer, doesn’t know what he’d say, and bursts through the door and takes quick steps out into the warm sand.

He squints into the sun and walks until he’s standing in the shade their training building casts. He takes a few deep breaths and lets them out again, trying to calm himself down. Never in his life has he had a reaction like that to another person. He’s pinned Lance that way a million times but that was before Avira. That was before he put a name to how he felt. Keith’s simultaneously turned on and mortified. He’d wanted to, wants to even now, kiss Lance so badly, among other things. He raises a hand to his cheek and it’s burning hot. He must be red in the face. He closes his eyes and breathes.

After a few moments, he doesn’t feel quite so shaken. Keith thinks that his reaction is probably normal. Anybody would get turned on being so close to someone they have feelings for, right? His breathing is normal again, and he can think more clearly beyond wanting to touch Lance. He’s gotten fresh air and clarity. He’s good now.

Well, except he doesn’t know how he’s going to explain his behavior to Lance. Keith doesn’t think Lance will believe he’s sick, he was fine earlier, and he doesn’t want Lance to mother hen him again. Keith leans against the wall, crossing his arms and resting his head back against the rough texture of the wall. There’s a glass shard that was once pressed into the building architecture in the sand at his feet. It’s blue and smoothed out like sea glass. He reaches down and grabs it. He runs a thumb over the smooth opaqueness and shoves it in his pocket for no reason.

“Hey, are you okay? You kind of took off in there.” Lance comes to a stop a few feet from him, farther than he normally would, and Keith is irritated he didn’t hear him coming. Lance is waiting for an answer to his question, shifting his weight.

Keith doesn’t look at him, just moves the sand around with his foot. “Yeah, I’m good. I just…needed some air.” It’s a true statement, though not as exact as Lance probably wants.

Keith looks up when Lance doesn’t say anything in response. He notices Lance’s eyebrows pull together and he looks put out by the answer, like he’s disappointed. Keith doesn’t think that’s right, Lance has no reason to be, and it prompts Keith to look closer at Lance. He’s looking away from Keith now, and he’s moved to lean one shoulder on the wall.

Lance is still standing too far away from him. It’s been irritating Keith since the moment he showed up to check on him. It makes him feel like he did something wrong. Lance is uncharacteristically silent and it’s upsetting Keith. Had he crossed a line somehow? Did Lance know somehow exactly what Keith had been thinking?

“I’m sorry.” He doesn’t know what he’s apologizing for exactly, but it feels like what he should be saying. He fights against the urge to fidget and holds his ground while he waits for any kind of response.

Lance seems shocked at the apology, finally looking up at Keith. “You’re sorry?” Lance questions, tone confused. “For what?” Keith just doesn’t understand what’s going on. He never really does, when it comes to talks about feelings. He always just stumbles along. Distantly, he wonders if the Avirans are waiting on them or if Lance told them to go home.

Keith shrugs. He doesn’t have an answer that he can say. He scrounges around in his brain until he can find something that’s not a lie. “I got, uh…a little intense. Sorry.”

Lance turns to him fully, pushing off of the wall. He scrubs a hand over his face like he’s irritated and trying to hold it together. He’s looking at Keith with an expression that’s not angry, per se, but he’s upset somehow. Keith regrets having said anything. He regrets having _feelings_. He’s not cut out for this.

“You are stupid.” Lance tells him, tone near monotone. “Everyone always says it’s me, but it’s you.” Lance shakes his head and takes a few steps back toward the training building, like it’s too difficult to talk to Keith or something.

“Excuse me?” Keith spits, shocked and angry. What the hell? He was apologizing for fucks sake. He stalks to where Lance is walking away from him and stops short of touching him. That seems like a bad idea. “I’m stupid?”

Lance stops and turns to Keith. He looks done with him. “Yeah.” Keith waits for Lance to elaborate a little bit, but it doesn’t happen. Keith has no idea what’s going on right now and he hates it. He rifles through all the things he might have done that Lance would call him stupid for and can’t find anything.

They have a silent standoff while Keith waits for an explanation and Lance is clearly waiting for Keith to figure it out. Keith bites down on his irritation. “Why am I stupid? I was just apologizing for how I acted.” His words are about as even as a hothead can hope for.

Lance just stares back at him like he’s trying to look at Keith’s soul or something. He raises his eyebrows at Keith in question and waits some more, he’s obviously holding onto the hope that Keith will just randomly catch onto why he’s stupid. Lance clearly thinks the answer is obvious. Keith shrugs in question, irritated that Lance won’t explain anything to him. Whatever, he’s not doing this. If Lance won’t help him understand, fine.

He doesn’t understand why they’re having this fight. He assumes it’s a fight. He’s mad at Lance, and apparently Lance is irritated at him for something. “Okay.” Keith bites, and shrugs past Lance, letting their shoulders hit when he passes him.

He only makes it ten steps or so before he can hear Lance sigh. “Keith—” He starts, tone apologetic, or at least softer than before, he can’t really tell. He can hear Lance taking steps in the sand after him but he doesn’t stop. He’s irritated and hurt.

Suddenly, there’s shade. It goes dark outside while something passes in front of one of the suns. It’s so weird that he turns back to look at Lance before looking up at the sky.

There, entering the atmosphere, is a Galra fleet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually took a self defense class, and that's exactly what we did. Mostly. There's still more to come! I'm not dead y'all I promise.


	6. This is not enjoyable

Whatever Lance wants to say to him is lost in the ensuing commotion. They stand there for a few precious seconds trying to comprehend what they’re seeing. The Galra fleet is approaching, with maybe thirty imposing grey and purple ships making their quick descent. The shade dissolves as the ships get closer, no longer in position to block the light.

Lance snaps out of it first. “Keith, we have to go.” There’s a wobble in his voice, and the fear makes Keith’s protective instincts spike. He never wants Lance to sound like that. Lance closes the distance between them, pulling on Keith’s arm. “Keith! Come on.”

Keith shakes it off and focuses. They’re fucked, that much is obvious, but they have a responsibility here. They’re paladins of Voltron and they’re not going to lay down and die. The chaos starts to pick up as Avirans realize what’s happening. There are people screaming as they run towards their homes for any kind of safety. Laser shots start to whip past them as soon as the Galra are close enough to aim. Flashes of running through a Galra hangar with Lance come to mind.

Keith pulls on Lance now, toward the direction of the castle. They have to move. “We have to defend the Avirans. I don’t have a lion, but you do. Get in Blue and do your best to provide support from above, I’ll do what I can from down here.” He hopes his false confidence is enough to reassure Lance. They should have discussed a plan on what to do a long time ago. They shouldn’t be winging it right now. Keith has made a lot of mistakes on this mission in a way he hasn’t in a long time, and it could cost them now.

Lance shrugs his arm free and they start into a run, dodging debris from buildings that are being blown up. An Aviran carrying her crying child darts in front of them. Her clothing is torn and burned on one side, and there is pastel blue blood dripping down her arm. She’s forced to stop as the tiny storefront she’d been heading toward collapses, throwing seafoam green sand into the air.

“In there!” Keith breaks away from Lance briefly to go to her aid. He whips his head around to look at the others in his vicinity. They’re not doing much better, huddling under delicate shelter in attempt to get away from laser fire. Keith ushers the woman toward a group of Avirans filing into what looks to him like a basement or cellar of some sort, the darkness of the inside of the shelter foreboding.

The woman hugs her child closer to her, cradling his little body with all four arms. “Thank you.” She spares him a grateful glance as the other Avirans take her by the hand. Keith has a brief moment of relief where at least he was able to help somebody.

When he returns back outside to look for Lance, panic spikes in him when he can’t immediately see a mop of brown hair. There’s too much smoke to be able to see, and several buildings have collapsed and sent debris into walkways. He turns back toward where they came to see Galra foot soldiers making a steady pace toward the direction of the castle. There’s too many. He and Lance cannot hold this number of Galra back by themselves.

Keith starts toward the castle again, hoping Lance had continued on course. He’s running but it’s hard in the sand, his feet sink in and slow his pace. He’s breathing hard and squinting against the sun and smoke. It feels too much like his nightmares. The image of Lance’s lifeless body in a forest from that very first dream that started all of this imprints itself in his brain. He wants to cry. The fight has barely begun and he’s already feeling hopeless.

Suddenly there’s a hand on his yanking him to the side behind an Aviran home, blocking out the lightning quick plasma being blasted at them. “Keith, oh my God, don’t run off!” Lance sounds both relieved and peeved. He still hasn’t let go of Keith’s hand and his eyes run down the length of his body like he’s making sure he’s still in one piece.

Keith feels relief so thick in his veins it makes him dizzy. “Lance.” He breaths out, trying to catch his breath. They’re wasting time, they can’t stand around like this. Lance seems to understand because he nods once and peeks around the building to see what the damage is like. He looks back at Keith and they both break into a sprint in the direction of the castle. Lance pulls his bayard and shoots rapid fire over his shoulder. He stops when the Galra are too far behind them for it to matter.

When they finally make it there, the castle is in even more disarray than the outskirts of town had been. One of the wings is on fire, and there’s people pouring both in and out of the building carrying whatever they can use as a weapon. The Galra will be here in a matter of minutes and they have no idea where the queen is or how to defend a planet like this. The two of them stop in the main entrance, the long stone hall stretching out in front of them. Keith spots one of the cooks carrying a knife hurrying deeper into the castle.

He turns to Lance. They have to split up now. It kills Keith to do it, they’re better together, but they have no choice. There’s so much he wants to say. This really could be the end for them, this situation is beyond fucked up, and there’s not a lot of hope. The Avirans have had two days of training, and there’s only thirty of them, and they don’t have the full team. They might not win this one.

_He might never know how I feel._

Keith takes the extra step toward Lance and pulls him into a hug. Lance stiffens then relaxes, bringing his arms up to wrap around Keith and hold him close. Keith’s not much of a hugger, but he won’t miss what might be his last opportunity. He can hear gunfire and explosions outside the door. He takes in the smell of Lance’s hair, and how right it feels to have both his arms wrapped around his waist. It’s everything he wants and he feels dumb that it took this mission to realize it.

Keith swallows the lump in his throat. “Be careful.” He mumbles, unsure if Lance can even hear him over the calamity going on. He must because he presses his face into Keith’s hair.

“I will. You be careful too.” They separate, taking a step back from each other. Their eyes meet briefly. Lance looks pained, like he doesn’t want to leave Keith, and it’s awful. Keith has never had many people in his life and he can’t imagine one now without Lance in it.

There’s a beat before Lance is taking quick steps toward the door, duty and obligation forcing them apart before anything more can be said. “I’ll find you when it’s over, meet me back where we landed the lions.” Keith nods in agreement and watches the door close behind Lance.

Keith takes a deep breath. Lets it out. He pulls his bayard, the sword flashing as it appears, and goes in search of the queen.

* * *

Keith is deep in the castle now. Deeper than he’s ever gone. He wonders if Lance would know where to go, if in all of his errand running he’d made it to this point. Keith runs until he stumbles across a huge wooden door, much like the room the two of them share, with two guards posted out front.

_These two fucking guards._

Keith probably will never get over it. He figures the queen is inside, surely the guards have nothing else to protect. Coming to a stop in front of them, he tries to reason with them.

“I need to see the queen. It’s for her own protection.” Keith isn’t even sure if that’s true. He knows the queen has caused this somehow, and he can’t guarantee he’s entering the room to protect her. The guards don’t know that though, they just think he’s a brave paladin of Voltron here to save the day. Or at least he hopes so.

The two guards share a look and come to a silent conclusion. “No.”

Keith hadn’t been anticipating that. He sighs. “Have it your way.” He grabs one of the guards by the arm, throwing him off balance as Keith hauls him in close as a shield. When the second guard tries to attack him, Keith knocks him out with the butt of his sword before doing the same to the second. He looks at the two bodies on the ground and doesn’t feel bad at all. This is why you hire real security.

He steps over the downed guards to pull open the heavy wooden door. The queen is seated at an ornate desk made of a pastel pink marbled stone. A quill and ink rests in the corner. The room itself is draped with tapestries and golden trimmed crown molding. The grandeur and vibe of it reminds him of that one Renaissance painting he’d learned about in school, the one with God reaching out a finger to Adam. A huge bed rests in the middle of the room, silk draped elegantly over the bedposts. Her majesty doesn’t seem surprised at all to see Keith.

“Are you not supposed to be out being a defender?” The queen greets him, leaning back in her velvet lined chair. Keith holds his ground and his temper. He needs information and he can’t get that if he can’t hold a conversation. He hopes Lance is doing okay.

Keith meets her eyes. He notices the queen is wearing black. It’s such a contrast to everything he’s seen on this planet that he almost asks about it. He dismisses the thought quickly, the Galra are on their way. “I’m being a defender by coming in here to ask you what you’ve done.”

The queen stands from her desk and slinks across the floor to meet him. She observes him quietly for a moment, appraising him. Keith does his best not to fidget, his dislike for her making it a little easier. Eventually, she speaks. “Who’s to say I’ve done anything?”

Keith rolls his eyes. “You’re perfectly calm. Your people are outside being murdered and you’re dressed for the occasion.” His eyes dip to her gown then to her face.

The queen makes a humming sound and tilts her head. “Maybe I do not fear death.” She’s toying with him, it’s clear to see, and Keith has lost his patience.

Keith has been good this entire mission. He’s done his best to be polite and put on fake smiles and held his temper. There’s a limit to the amount of bullshit he’s willing to put up with though, and he’d be damned if even Shiro wouldn’t snap by now. “Cut the shit lady, we know you’re involved with the Galra.”

The queen’s fake smile drops off of her face. Her mouth twists down into something ugly, the mask slipping away. The air of royalty and pretentiousness fades into something dark and twisted. The queen’s shoulders fall from their perfect posture to slouch forward and she moves back to sit on the edge of her desk. Keith thinks this image must be who the queen is when she’s not in character. He’s glad it’s ugly.

The queen heaves a long sigh before she begins. “It doesn’t matter, you know. You’re too late.” She seems content with this, almost maliciously happy about it. “But if you really want to know, I’ll tell you.”

Keith makes a _get on with it_ motion and she continues. “Three days before the distress call you and your fellow paladins responded to went out, the Galra were on Avira. They offered me a deal.”

Keith doesn’t like the sound of that. “What kind of deal?” They’ve been to several planets on many different missions by now and he’s never heard of a planet making a deal with the Galra.

The queen huffs a laugh. “They wanted you. They want the paladins of Voltron. See, they know that you respond to distress calls. They know where you’re going and where you’ve been.” She pauses for dramatic effect and Keith puts more effort than necessary into not punching her. “They offered me a deal. If I lure the paladins of Voltron to Avira and pose a scenario in which the Galra can capture them, they will both let our planet survive and pay me and the other survivors handsomely enough to not want for anything again.”

Keith doesn’t know what to say. He lets the information sink in. He’s disgusted. The queen obviously thinks nothing of using her responsibility to the people to get paid. He and Lance had come here solely to get sold to the Galra.

Keith grits his teeth, jaw clenching. “Well how did that work out for you? Your people are getting slaughtered right now, and you’re next. Was it worth the money or are you so stupid that you didn’t get paid up front?” He spits, glad when she flinches back.

He laughs meanly when he’s met with silence. “So here you are. Broke and ready for death.” Keith shakes his head. He’s so done with everything. He feels sick to his stomach for what she’s done to her people. “Your people trusted you.”

That’s what gets to him most of all. It’s not almost being sold into slavery to the Galra, or getting shot, or being lied to about it all. It’s that the queen would offer up thousands of innocent lives, blind in their trust, for money.

The queen sneers at him. “And what do you know about trust? Get off your high horse, paladin, you are no better than the rest.”

Keith considers the question. He thinks about Lance and what he means to Keith. He thinks about Shiro and everything he’s done for Keith over the years. He thinks of Pidge’s determination to find her family, and Hunk’s never-ending patience. That’s what trust is supposed to be.

_He trusts you._

It’s being there for those you love. It’s having the backs of your teammates. He’s almost sad, really, that the queen has ended up like this. “Maybe you’re right.” He shrugs and turns back toward the door. “But you’re the one sitting here alone in this room with nothing to show for it.”

The queen says nothing in response. She just turns her head to look down at the floor. It’s silent. Keith can hear the castle residents screaming as they battle with the Galra. Dust trickles from the ceiling as the building shakes from the impact of debris and gunfire.

Without looking back, Keith opens the door and shuts it soundly behind him.

* * *

Keith has to get out of the castle. He can’t stay here. There’s not even any real point in trying to protect it. His main objective now is the Avirans. He needs a weapon and a way to get the Avirans to safety.

He creates a plan as he escapes. He’s twisting down corridors, feet echoing as he goes, on the lookout for anything that looks like it will lead him outside. The longer he runs the more frustrated he gets. Refocusing, he works it out in his head. If he returns to the building they were using for training on the outskirts of town, there’s a good chance the weapons they were practicing with will still be there. Armed, he can then move the Avirans. But where? All the buildings on this planet are made from the same stone and canvas roofing. It’ll never hold up.

“Dammit.” He mumbles under his breath when he meets a dead end to the hallway. Backtracking, he goes the opposite way. The sounds of the struggle going on get closer as he follows the hall, and he holds his bayard at the ready as he goes.

The answer comes to him while he struggles with a door, turning the knob to no avail. The training building. It’s large, and on the outskirts of town. The Galra have already been through that area and so it’s unlikely they will return there. It’s big enough to hold many people and covert enough in its rundown appearance that it won’t attract suspicion.

He could almost cry from how happy he is to find an exit. A little inlet in the wall offers up a door that leads him into the sand behind the castle.

He’s met with destruction. Most of the town is in ruins. Canvas roofing is on fire, and shards of colored glass that used to be adorned in walls now lay haphazard in pastel sand. He cannot see any signs of life, but he can hear both crying and screaming so he knows there must be some survivors.

The Blue lion whips across the sky over him, heading toward the castle, and Keith is comforted to see it relatively unharmed. There’s a scorch mark along Blue’s back and Keith can’t allow himself to think about that right now.

Keith stalks toward the wreckage the Galra footsoldiers have left behind. Peering into buildings as he heads for his destination, he is met with deserted homes. Tables and chairs lay knocked over, and glass and roofing covers the flooring. It hurts Keith to look at it and hopes the queen gets what she deserves.

“Paladin! How good it is to see you.” A familiar face appears at his right, reaching toward him desperately. Keith flinches back before righting himself only to come face to face with Rhaegar. In all his preoccupation with getting shot and dealing with the queen he’d almost forgotten about their somewhat irritating new friend.

“Are you okay?” It’s a dumb question, but it seems appropriate. Rhaegar’s clothing is torn, and there’s smudges of black from smoke and debris on his body.

Rhaegar nods quickly. “Yes. I am unharmed. I am glad I found you, we should stick together. For safety.” He scoots closer to Keith and looks around them in trepidation. “I do not know what is going on. I know there were threats of Galra attacking but no one is prepared.”

“Thank her majesty for that.” He can’t help the jab. Rhaegar looks at him with somber eyes and Keith feels bad for ruining his image of her. Oh well, he would find out sometime, assuming he survives.

“Come on, I’m going to round up survivors and find a weapon.” Keith tilts his head in the direction of the training building and Rhaegar eagerly follows his lead.

They make their way as quickly and efficiently as they can, looking into buildings and debris for anyone not in shelter. Before they get ten minutes into searching and walking, Rhaegar speaks up again.

“Actually, I remember something.” Rhaegar stops walking and continues with his realization, eyes wide. “There is a Galra ship that crashed near to where I first met you. There were many soldiers that survived the crash emerging with weapons, perhaps some are still there?”

Keith stills and turns around to look at Rhaegar. He feels hope for the first time in a long time. “You mean like the kind of ship that would be used to transport weapons and other things?”

Rhaegar steps closer to Keith, nodding his head. “Yes! Exactly like that. Shall we go?”

Shall we go? Uh, yeah. Yes, they shall go because Keith’s pretty sure that’s the ship housing Red. Or at least there’s a pretty good chance it is. Either way he can’t not go make sure, the prospect of finally being reunited with the Red lion too good to pass on. “Lead the way.”

Rhaegar grins at him and steps up to him to lead Keith to their destination. “Of course. Happy to help.” Keith falls into step next to him and tries not to get his hopes up.

Rhaegar walks too slowly for the urgency of the situation and it irritates Keith, but he doesn’t say a word. Eventually, they do make it to the ship. It’s on the outskirts of town, close to where they landed the lions on arrival, just as Rhaegar said it’d be. The ship is on fire, smoke pouring up and into the atmosphere from one of the wings. Pieces of metal litter the ground, and the main door is open. It’s difficult to see inside, the crash must have busted the lights, and the ominous silence and blackness give the impression of a haunted house rather than a ship.

“I will follow you?” Rhaegar pipes up when Keith is silent too long. He sounds unsettled and Keith doesn’t blame him.

They make their way into the ship cautiously, on high alert for any survivors looking to take down one last enemy. It’s so dark that Keith almost can’t see. He’s surprised to find that he can, and the daylight outside the ship makes it a little easier. There’s no sign of life in the immediate interior of the ship and they snake deeper into it by empty hallways.

There is only the sound of their feet on the metal floor. Rhaegar almost sticks himself to Keith he’s following him so closely, and he lets out a shout when part of the roof falls with a bang to the floor behind them. “This is not enjoyable.” Rhaegar laments quietly.

Keith agrees. _This is not enjoyable_ could be the tag line for this entire mission. He thinks Lance would find that funny, and he wishes he were here to tell him.

Suddenly, they come to the hangar of the ship. It’s mostly intact despite the crash, with only the outlet outside being destroyed, debris blocking the way out. He doesn’t care about any of that though and breaks into a run when the faintly glowing force field around Red disrupts the darkness, keeping anybody but him out.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.” He tells her immediately, coming to a stop in front of the force field and raising his hands to touch it. He sends her all of his feelings, the sorrow and regret he’d felt at finding out he’d left her behind without a way to get her back. He thinks she must have stayed because she could not leave to find him without deactivating the force field, and he knows the Galra have ways of containing the lions. He lets her know how much he missed her and how glad he is to see her again. Something is wrong, though. She doesn’t seem happy to see him. Actually, she’s panicked, the words _get away_ rising in his mind.

“I’m rather disappointed you know.” Rhaegar’s voice echoes through the hangar. Keith turns his back to Red to look at him in confusion. Rhaegar seems off and it feels like Keith is missing something.

“Disappointed?” He asks, on the defensive now. Red is upset, she wants him to leave this place, and that means danger is lurking. “What do you mean?” He catches the flash of something shining out of the corner of his eye, the red hue from his lion glancing off of metal. It’s gone when he turns his head to see what it is.

Rhaegar is closing in on him, coming closer to stand a little ways in front of him. Keith puts a hand on his bayard and Rhaegar’s eyes flick between it and Keith’s face. Rhaegar grins at him. “I really wanted you to piece it together. It would ruin everything, of course, but you were right there. You figured out almost every part of the plan, but you glanced over just this one thing. What a shame.”

Keith does pull his bayard now. Rhaegar no longer seems like a friend. “What are you talking about?”

Rhaegar sighs. “You are not leaving here with the Red lion. In fact, you will not be reuniting with your fellow paladins.” He rolls his eyes at Keith’s grip on his bayard. “And you can put that away, it will not help you now. Nor will your lion, we have a hold on her to keep her from moving.”

Galra step out from the shadows of the hangar, the red hue from his lion casting them in crimson. There’s many, at least twenty, and they form a circle around him just out of his reach. As a unit, they raise their laser guns in his direction. Keith just wants to know how the fuck they’re keeping Red hostage.

Keith is speechless. He’s angry, at himself and at Rhaegar, but he stays quiet.

Rhaegar’s mouth raises into the smug smile of someone who knows they’re going to win. “You had everything right. The queen, the money, the selling of the Paladins. You just missed the fact that the queen was not operating alone. She had me.”

Keith feels monumentally stupid. He should have seen this coming, should have known the queen wasn’t clever enough to coordinate everything alone. He remembers how Rhaegar had been the only one in the town when they’d arrived, how everyone but him had been in hiding. That should have been their first red flag.

“She’s splitting the money with you?” Keith intones. He can’t do anything now. He can’t escape with this many soldiers and he’ll get killed if he tries.

Rhaegar nods. “Yes, almost half.” He clicks his tongue and takes a few steps closer to Keith, bending at the waist to get in his face. “But you see, I was mostly in it to knock the paladins of Voltron down a few pegs. You all are so high and mighty, but all you do is cause more chaos. The Galra at least are single minded in their conquering. There was a way of life, and the Avirans were fine with that.”

Keith meets Rhaegar’s eyes, holding them with his own. “I’m sure the Avirans would rather have their freedom. The Galra would have eventually made it here, would have eventually murdered your people and occupied your planet. You’re stupid if you think the Galra will spare you when this is over.”

“Maybe not. But at least I will know I helped bring down Voltron.” Rhaegar gives him one last look, as if Keith is the gum stuck to the bottom of his shoe, and turns to walk away. The Galra soldiers part to let him through before reforming the circle.

Rhaegar’s voice echoes throughout the room. “Lock him up.”

The Galra advance on him, and two of them on either side grab him roughly by the arms and force them behind his back. A bag is put over his head so that he can’t see. He feels his hands get cuffed together and a soldier shoves him in the back roughly to push him forward.

He doesn’t know where they’re going. They walk for a long time, from metal to sand and then back to metal again. He thinks they must have gotten on another ship. He spend the whole walk trying to overcome his panic about where Lance is and if he’s okay. He can’t warn him. There’s nothing he can do to protect Lance now but hope for the best.

He gets shoved and he falls to his knees. It stings when he hits the floor, head hitting a wall. The bag gets ripped from his head and he blinks as his eyes adjust to the light. He focuses in time to see a Galra soldier swing shut the door to the thick glass prison door. It blends with the rest of the wall to form one impenetrable window into his cell.

One of the Galra soldiers presses a button on the outside of his cell and his static laced voice comes through. “I’d get comfortable if I were you.” The guards leave him with no further comments.

Keith leans back against the wall and stares out the front of his cell. He’s not religious, but he thinks maybe praying won’t hurt.

_Please let Lance be safe._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They're really in it now huh. Hope you enjoyed the chapter!


	7. Yellow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow it's been a while. Sorry about that, I'm currently going to grad school so that owns my ass. Here is the next chapter! Bear with me, this chapter is an in-between chapter that sets up a bunch of things. Also, it's 1 AM so sorry for any mistakes.

Days pass. Or at least, Keith thinks it’s days. He falls asleep a few times, and the Galra bring him meals and water. He seriously doubts he’s getting three square meals a day so ballpark he guesses it’s been a week. His hair is greasy, and he’s still covered in dirt and smoke and other things from the fight.

_Fuck, I wish I could shower._

He still doesn’t know what they want with him. The Galra haven’t spoken to him at all since they locked him up, nor have they attempted to move him. Keith assumes the Galra are hoping Lance rescues him.

God, Keith hopes Lance is okay. With nothing but time to think, every horror story of what could have possibly happened to Lance has played out in his mind. The only thing that makes him think that Lance is still a free man is that if the Galra had him they would surely torture Keith with that knowledge.

So, Keith waits. There’s nothing he can do but wait. He has no weapons, just the blue sea glass stone he’d shoved in his pocket outside of the training building. Thinking about it now, Keith realizes Lance had been about to say something when the Galra had arrived.

_Fantastic, another thing to agonize over._

Keith is interrupted from his thoughts by a Galra soldier coming into view of the glass window that makes up his cell door.

The Galra puts a finger on the button for the comm system and his static voice comes through. “I’m going to put these cuffs on you, and if you fight back you’ll be shot dead.” The Galra points a purple finger at the laser gun connected to the ceiling just outside of Keith’s cell.

“It’s nice to see you too.” Keith replies, rolling his eyes. He holds his wrists out in compliance. There’s not a lot to be done at this point, he doesn’t want to get shot.

The Galra enters the passcode and Keith’s cell slides open. The soldier enters and cuffs Keith, the force of it hurts his wrists but he says nothing. He’s yanked to his feet and shoved out of the cell. Nothing else is said as he’s lead down a dimly lit grey hall.

Eventually, they come to an unlabeled door. There’s no one standing guard in the hall, nor is there a passcode to open it. The door slides open to reveal what looks like a crude hospital bed and a bunch of monitors. Something about it looks familiar to him and it’s not until he gets closer that he realizes this is the same type of bed with restraints he’d rescued Shiro from.

Immediately his stomach drops. Now that he’s getting a better view of the room, there’s more he starts to notice. There are syringes laid out on a medical tray next to the bed. There’s a yellow substance in it that almost glows and Keith wants nothing to do with that. The whole room is eerie and dim, like something out of a horror movie. Keith wonders if this is what it was like for Shiro. He almost gags the thought makes him feel so sick to his stomach.

Rhaegar enters the room with two more Galra soldiers. “Good to see you again, Keith. Enjoying your stay?” His tone is falsely polite, almost sing song.

Keith meets his eyes. “Five stars.” He fucking hates Rhaegar. He didn’t like him even when he was supposedly a good guy, now that Keith has a reason to hate him it’s just so much stronger.

Rhaegar just gives him a rueful smile and points at the metal hospital bed. “Lie down.” It’s not a question. Rhaegar’s lackeys take a step toward him. Keith doesn’t have much of an option, so he does what he’s told. It’s cold as he lays down, the unforgiving metal uncomfortable on his back. He has to squint against the ceiling lights in his eyes. It makes his head hurt.

“It’s not enough that you sold your own kind to the Galra, now you’re working with them?” It’s weird to Keith that Rhaegar is still here. He shouldn’t have anything left to gain from the Galra now that he’d delivered Keith to them.

Rhaegar snaps on some plastic gloves and walks to the edge of Keith’s bed, looking down on him. “There are bigger things going on than just you, you know.” It’s an incredibly vague but ominous answer.

“Like what?” Keith almost doesn’t want to know. Rhaegar just looks at him for a few moments before picking up one of the syringes.

“Do you know what this is, Keith?” He taps the glass of the syringe with a fingernail, popping a bubble trapped in the liquid.

Keith thinks it looks vaguely familiar. “No.”

Rhaegar grins at him and leans in. He holds the syringe in front of Keith’s face so he can see it more clearly. This close up it’s glowing and moving, the liquid inside a force of its own. “This is raw, pure, quintessence.”

Keith flinches back and hits his head on the metal underneath him, twisting in an attempt to move away. Rhaegar darts a hand out and pushes on Keith’s forehead roughly to force him back down.

Keith takes a breath to get ahold of himself. He can’t panic now, that won’t help him. “I thought quintessence was purple.” All of what he knows about quintessence revolves around purple liquid being injected in order to create monsters with incredible lifespans and abilities. He’s heard during his limited time with Voltron that this is what keeps Zarkon alive after all this time but doesn’t know much else. He’s certainly never seen it in person.

“You’re correct, mostly. Refined quintessence is purple. This is quintessence in its most raw form.” Rhaegar explains, a sick satisfaction in his expression as he takes in Keith’s discomfort.

The dreaded question arises. “What does that do?”

Rhaegar makes a gesture at the two Galra soldiers and they move to either side of Keith. They grab his wrists. He fights back when he notices they’re trying to restrain him to the bed. He gets an arm free and punches one of the soldiers, but it only lasts a second before he’s caught again. Eventually, they get him tied down. He can’t move, the restraints cutting into his wrists with how tightly they’re strapped down.

A large metal divider is pulled around Keith’s hospital bed until it’s just Keith and Rhaegar. The other Galra soldiers are on the other side, guns in hand. It seems extreme to Keith, but he doesn’t exactly know what’s going on here. The lights are switched off, the emergency lighting lining the ceiling and floor the only light to see by.

Rhaegar swipes something on Keith’s inner arm at his elbow at the same place an IV would go. He prods at Keith’s arm until he finds a visible vein before grabbing the syringe in hand again. Keith can’t do anything but stare in fascinated horror as he is injected with raw quintessence. It’s painful as it floods his veins, the burning sensation is almost too much. He feels exhausted and vividly awake all at once. His vision blurs and then sharpens.

“What the fuck?” It’s garbled coming out of his mouth, slurred like he’s drunk.

Rhaegar laughs at him, a cruel shock of a thing. “What does it do?” Rhaegar repeats Keith’s question, “We’re going to find out.”

With that, Keith is left alone in the room to burn from the inside out.

* * *

“Keith!” Lance is screaming his name, the fear so palpable it makes Keith sick.

Keith is running as fast as he can through the forest. He can’t find Lance, he can’t find any of them. Trees fall down around him, the sound of cracking tree limbs echoing in his ears. He has to strain to hear his teammates.

“Keith!” This time it’s Shiro. It’s coming from the same direction as Lance’s screaming. Laser fire whips past his head. It burns his cheek.

He can’t run fast enough. There’s too many Galra. He won’t make it. He won’t save them.

Suddenly, he’s burning. It’s so hot that it’s burning him, his nerves are frayed and vulnerable to the heat. He can’t stand it and falls to his knees on the forest floor.

Then there is nothing.

* * *

Keith wakes up with a gasp.

He feels like he got hit by a car. His skin is too sensitive, he can feel every place his clothes are touching him. He can feel the scrape of the wall of his cell as he leans against it, the rough texture of it grating at him. The lights are too bright, and everything is incredibly clear. The colors are saturated, everything he can see is sharper than he thought was possible.

He brings a hand up to rub his eyes only to stop his hand right in front of his face. His hand is purple. It’s still his hand, no Galra fur, but it’s Galra purple. He brings his other hand up. Also purple. Keith sits still for a moment, looking down at his hands as he remembers Rhaegar’s needle.

Slowly, he crawls to the front of his cell to see his reflection in the glass. He still looks like himself in shape. No fur anywhere on his body and no tail. Purple paints his entire body, and his ears are pointed like a Galra’s would be. None of that holds his focus though as he meets his own eyes in the glass. Yellow, completely yellow.

_This shouldn’t be possible._

It’s a thought that plays on repeat as he comes to terms with what he’s seeing. He doesn’t know what to do with this. What are the others going to say when they see him? Is it permanent? As far as Keith knew, he was human. Now, he’s not so sure.

_I have to get out of here._

“Good, You’re awake.” Rhaegar’s voice cuts through his rising panic.

Keith turns to look at Rhaegar coming down the hall towards him, walking into view as he approaches Keith’s cell.

“What the fuck did you do to me?” Keith is pissed now. It’s one thing to get sold to the Galra, it’s another thing entirely to become their little experiment.

“I think the real question you should be asking is ‘what am i?’, we certainly would love to know.” It’s an honest statement, Rhaegar’s curiousity about Keith’s new look plain to see.

“You did this, you injected me with the quintessence and now I’m Galra, you tell me what the fuck I am.” Keith doesn’t understand what they have to gain from this. Why bother injecting Keith at all? Are they planning on injecting others? Do they already have others locked away on this ship they’ve been experimenting on all this time?

“Truly, we were not expecting this. A Galra cannot be simply created from quintessence. I would get used to it if I were you, it seems this was within you all along. Rest up, Keith, we have bigger plans.” Having had the last word on the subject, Rhaegar continues his way down the hall, leaving Keith to his crisis.

_This was within you all along._

Somehow, Keith knows he’s right.

* * *

More days pass. His appearance never changes. The Galra leave him alone.

He misses Lance and the others. He wonders if Lance has told Shiro what’s happened to Keith. If Lance even knows Keith was taken and not dead somewhere.

Keith takes the sea glass stone out of his pocket. It’s a nice shade of blue that reminds him of Lance’s eyes.

_Lance’s eyes? I’m so soft._

He rubs his thumb over the stone, the ache of loneliness and loss weighing heavy with nothing else to think about. He needs to think about escape, but he doesn’t see how he can do it trapped in a cell with no door. Especially not with a gun mounted to the ceiling and pointed at his cell. He’s sure there’s a video feed somewhere as well.

The ship as a whole shakes as a loud boom echoes through the hall, the room lurching slightly to the right for a moment before righting itself. Keith has to put a hand on the wall to keep from sliding at the movement. He doesn’t dare let himself hope that someone has come to his rescue, he won’t survive the disappointment.

Shouts from Galra soliders echo in the distance as a commotion erupts. Keith gets distracted by a whirring noise only to find it coming from the laser pointed at his cell, the entire thing swiveling to point down the hall instead.

The sounds of calamity get louder and louder as it approaches. Keith stands up to prepare to fight. This might be his chance to escape even if whatever is causing the commotion is not a rescuer.

Suddenly, a figure comes into view.

Unruly hair and glasses make Keith lightheaded with how strongly the affection and relief hits him. “Pidge!”

She comes to a stop in front of him, folding over as she pants from running the length of the hall. She straightens as she gets a good look at him, squinting.

“What did you do?” She steps forward to work on the cell door’s passcode.

“I didn’t do anything!” Keith is the victim here, thank you very much.

“We’re going to have to put a bag over your head before Allura sees you. She is not going to like this.” Pidge is working pretty leisurely for someone trying to outrun the Galra and help break out a prisoner. Keith approaches the glass, watching her work.

Keith ignores the statement, though it’s probably true, Allura is _not_ going to like Keith’s makeover. “Is Lance with you? Is he okay?”

Pidge’s eyes cut to him for a moment, softening as they look at him before turning back to her work. “Yes, he’s with us. He’s been worried sick about you, he doesn’t sleep at night.”

Keith feels a burden lift from him knowing that his little family is together and safe. Well, as safe as running from the Galra ever gets. Pidge finally cracks the code on the cell and the door slides open with a whoosh.

“Come on, lover boy Lance is waiting for you.” Pidge heads down the hall.

Keith almost trips as he runs after her. “Pidge!”

She just cackles as she leads him out to the main fight.


	8. Sea Glass Stone

Pidge leads him down hallways, their feet echoing off of the metal floor as they run. The purple lights lining the floor still hurt his new eyes, but he finds that he can see a lot farther than he used to be able to. The fighting gets louder and louder, the laser fire and shouting way too loud for his Galra hearing.

“How did you guys find me?” Keith has to raise his voice to be heard.

Pidge doesn’t spare him a glance as she keeps an eye on the path in front of them. “We’ll explain everything later, and so will you. It wasn’t easy.” She sounds out of breath, so Keith leaves it at that.

Eventually they turn a corner and then they’re right on top of the struggle. It stops him short and he takes a minute to take in the scene before he gets too lost in the struggle. Pidge seems to be of the same mind and comes to a stop beside him.

The first thing to catch his eye is the large line of damage cutting through the wall, clearly the path of a large laser beam. There are Galra doing their best to contain the fight, blocking the exits and shooting somewhat haphazardly into the room. There is smoke in the room from something and it mixes with the laser fire to create streaks of chaos. Glowing movement catches his eye and he turns until he can see Shiro, hand at the ready, cutting down a Galra soldier. Much like with his reunion with Pidge, Keith is warm with the knowledge that Shiro is here, helping to rescue him. The next thing he notices is the Red lion, way too large for the small space, with her force field down. He feels their bond pull on his mind.

_I’ve been waiting._

The words rise to the forefront of his mind, the impatient tone of it coated with affection to ease the sting. He grins to himself and pokes back at the bond, letting her know he understands.

“Let’s get out of here.” Pidge pulls on him to follow her, skirting the edge of the room for as long as they can go without being noticed. Like this, it’s easier to avoid the crossfire and Keith takes quick steps toward the Red lion. He doesn’t see any of the other lions, so he assumes Red is their escape plan.

The ship rocks again, throwing everyone to the ground with a bang. He lands hard on his palms, and his hip is going to bruise for sure with how hard it bounced off the metal flooring. He looks ahead of him to see Pidge wincing as she gets to her feet, she seems alright though, shaking it off and helping Keith quickly to his feet.

He can’t see Shiro anymore and that makes him nervous, but he can’t see much else other than smoke. He starts to cough against it when a hand latches onto his wrist and pulls him along even faster.

All at once, they’re standing in front of the Red lion. Keith puts a hand out to touch her and she opens her mouth to let him in. He wants more than anything to escape, but he’s not leaving without Shiro. He assumes Lance isn’t here or Pidge would have said something. He’s seen no sign of Hunk either.

“Shiro! I’ve got him, come on!” Pidge yells into the room but her voice gets lost in the turmoil. Keith moves to stand on the pathway into Red, the light from within her illuminating him from behind. This must be what attracts Shiro, because he appears out of nowhere, shoving at them both to force them into Red. He gets no reunion, they have to survive first, and makes a dive for the pilot seat even as Red is still closing her mouth.

“We have to go. The ship is entering a planet’s atmosphere and there’s enough damage here that the gravity will cause it to freefall.” Shiro’s voice is urgent, as if Keith is leisurely taking a Sunday drive instead of gripping onto the controls.

He does as asked though, the force of his take off causing Pidge and Shiro to hold on tight to Red or risk falling down again. Red rips a giant hole right in the side of the ship, bursting out into the blackness of space. Galra soldiers get sucked out into the void as the replicated gravity of the ship goes out. Keith doesn’t slow down until he can see nothing but empty space behind them. Once he lets go of the controls, Red starts in what must be the direction of the castle.

Everything is still for a moment as their adrenaline fades and they realize that they didn’t die. They made it. Shiro and Pidge got him out of there.

Keith turns to look back at them both. Shiro is staring at him with wide eyes, and he remembers what he looks like. He’s glad he doesn’t see any disgust there, just confusion and relief at the sight of Keith’s face. Pidge just looks happy to be alive.

“What happened to you?” Shiro asks him. It’s laced with concern, and Keith has missed him so much, but he knows this conversation needs to wait until they’re all together again.

“I’ll explain later.” Keith stands and takes the few steps towards them, ruffling Pidge’s hair before he pulls Shiro into a hug. Shiro pats him on the back. When he steps back, Pidge is glaring at him, but he thinks she’s struggling to hold the expression around a smile.

“I’m sure you’ve been wanting this back.” Shiro hands over Keith’s bayard. He’s struck dumb by the fact that he’s gone all this time without it. He can’t even recall at which point he’d lost it.

Keith looks up at him. “Where did you get this? I lost it somewhere.”

Shiro shrugs and grins at him. “It was laying at Red’s feet when we got here.”

What a conundrum that one is. Somehow Red magically obtained his bayard again and forked it over for Shiro when it was clear a rescue mission was taking place.

_I’ll take better care of it, I promise._

He sends the thought towards Red and gets rewarded with a little mental growl, the lion equivalent of _you better_.

Before long, Red is flying into the castle hangar. He’s relieved to see all of the other lions present in their designated spaces as they land. Red’s mouth lowers and they shuffle out.

Keith isn’t even all the way out of his lion before Lance launches himself at him, arms wrapping around Keith’s neck as he’s forced to take most of Lance’s body weight.

“—so sorry, I was so worried about you. We’ve been looking for you all this time. I thought I told you not to ever scare me like that again.” Keith misses the first part of what Lance says, his face in his neck obscuring some of the words. Keith brings his arms up to wrap around Lance’s waist, running a hand over his back. He holds Lance close and basks in the feeling of everything being okay again. Lance pulls away and Keith notices there’s a light flush dusting his cheeks and Lance isn’t looking directly into his face like he’s embarrassed by his concern.

_Fuck he’s so cute._

Eventually, Lance does meet Keith’s eyes and Lance flinches back with the shock. “What? _What?_ Oh my God.” His voice gets louder with every word and it’s Keith’s turn to flinch.

Keith takes a step back from Lance. “It’s still me. I just…the Galra gave me something and now I look like this.” He hadn’t been worried about Lance’s reaction, but maybe he should have been.

Lance relaxes as he looks Keith over, head to toe. Keith watches as Lance’s eyes roam over his new ears and the purple of his skin. It’s unsettling, he wants Lance to be okay with this. He’s still Keith.

“I have to say, the ears are really working for you.” Lance says at length, a small smile pulling up the corner of his mouth. Keith lets out a breath.

“Thank you, I grew them myself. Well, with some help.” He grins back at Lance.

Keith finally looks over Lance’s shoulder to find the entire rest of the team standing in line, watching them interact with rapt focus. Hunk’s mouth is hanging open a little in shock, and Coran and Shiro wear matching expressions, eyebrows raised. He hadn’t realized they had an audience and Keith clears his throat, taking a step in the direction of the team.

“It’s good to see everyone.” He breaks the weird tension, and Hunk steps forward to wrap him in a hug. It’s nice, it’s no secret that Hunk gives good hugs.

“It’s great to have you back. We spent so long looking for you.” Hunk says as he releases Keith. He’s glad Hunk doesn’t comment on his appearance.

Allura, however, lets him know exactly what she thinks. “How can this be? You are a Paladin of Voltron, you cannot look like a Galra.” She’s frowning as she looks him over, and while Keith isn’t exactly a fan of his makeover, he’s offended by the blatant displeasure over something aesthetic.

_Isn’t that kinda racist?_

“There’s not much I can do about it. It’s not like I’m different now, I’m still me.” He replies. Allura doesn’t look satisfied with his answer at all. He actually thinks she’s going to push the issue, but Shiro cuts in before anything else can be said.

“It’s been a long day for everybody, and I’m sure Keith wants a shower and some food. Let’s table everything until tomorrow.” Shiro meets Keith’s eyes and gives him a little nod, and Keith is grateful.

In agreement, everyone starts to shuffle out of the room. He’s the last one out, and the others have headed in the direction of their rooms, so he’s startled to find Lance lagging behind so they can walk side by side toward the showers. It’s a comfortable silence as they walk, just taking comfort in the presence of each other. They don’t say anything until they’re forced to go separate ways, Lance’s room farther down the hall and the showers around the corner. They stop at the intersection of the halls.

“I’m really glad you’re back.” Lance says quietly, the quiet of the ship subconsciously forcing him to lower his voice. He’s shifting his weight from foot to foot like he’s nervous.

“Me too. I was so scared something had happened to you. I didn’t know if you were okay or if you had gone down on Avira.” It’s easy to say in the comfortable space between them, the prying eyes of the others not there to burden them.

Lance goes in for another hug, this one not as desperate as before. Lance’s relief is almost palpable in the way he holds Keith close, one hand on the back of his head to pull him even closer. He hadn’t thought he was taller than Lance, and he has a suspicion that this is another Galra side effect. He doesn’t mind it.

When they pull apart, their eyes meet, and Keith realizes how close Lance’s face is. He can feel Lance’s breath on his chin and their foreheads are almost touching. He notices how very blue Lance’s eyes are this close up, and he’s reminded of the sea glass stone still in his pocket. Lance’s hands are resting on Keith’s shoulders while his own are on Lance’s waist.

When trying to recall it later that night, Keith isn’t actually sure who leans in first. Like magnets, they come together, and Lance brushes his lips against Keith’s. It’s barely a touch at first, just testing the waters, but then Lance presses in again more insistently. The kiss is slow, and achingly sweet. It feels so incredibly right that Keith isn’t sure how he’d been so blind before. One of Lance’s hands threads up into Keith’s hair, and it feels so good that a small noise escapes him. Lance shivers at the sound and Keith pulls away.

Lance is grinning up at him, flush high on his cheeks but his eyes are so bright. “I had some time to think while we were searching for you. I was right before, you _are_ stupid. I decided I’m tired of waiting for you to catch on.”

Their conversation outside of the training building clicks into place. In fact, all of the puzzle pieces come together. All of this time, Lance was wanting him just as much. Keith is lightheaded, and the whole situation feels like a dream. He’s afraid he’ll wake up and it’ll be different. Keith has never had something like this before. He’s moody, and aggressive. He can’t carry small talk to save his life and doesn’t know how to express his feelings. He’s never been anybody’s first choice. He knows better than to take this for granted.

Keith opens and closes his mouth a few times. “I like you, Lance. I really like you.”

_What am I? Five?_

Lance laughs, head tilting back. “Yeah, so I gathered,” he meets Keith’s eyes, “I really like you too.”

They stand there for a few moments. Keith takes a few steps back. “I should go shower.”

Lance turns toward the direction of his bedroom, still smiling. “I’ll see you in the morning. Eat something before you go to bed.”

Keith watches him walk all the way back to his room. Lance rolls his eyes when he sees Keith hasn’t moved. “Goodnight, Samurai.” Lance sing-songs at him from down the hall, disappearing into his room.

Keith blushes, glad no one is around to see him act like an idiot, and goes to shower.

That night before he goes to bed, he sets the sea glass stone on his dresser. Worry about the team meeting and Galra plans can wait until morning.

He looks at the stone from his bed as he falls asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally, they kiss. It only took 30,000 words, but we did it folks.


	9. Bigger Plans

The next morning, Keith blinks his eyes open at the sound of his alarm going off. They’re in space, so there’s no light coming from a window to wake him naturally. He sits up and turns it off, rubbing a hand over his face as he does. He swings one leg over the side of his bed and gets up to get ready for the day.

He doesn’t feel any different from normal, despite the events of the previous day. He grabs a new set of clothes to change into and his toothbrush before making his way down the hall to the bathroom. He changes in one of the stalls, throwing his pajamas in the laundry bin, and approaches the main area of the bathroom that contains the shower stalls and sinks. He thinks about Lance and their kiss while he brushes his teeth, smiling to himself as he does.

Shiro enters the bathroom as Keith is rinsing his mouth out, looking rumpled and sleepy. Shiro’s feet are bare and his pajama shirt has a hole in one corner and reads ‘my favorite people call me dad’. Keith is willing to bet money it was a gift from Pidge. Keith shaves his face while Shiro changes into his clothes for the day. Eventually, he moves to stand at the sink next to Keith’s. They don’t talk for a minute, the routine of getting ready enough to silence them.

“What are you all smiley about?” Shiro questions, meeting Keith’s eyes in the mirror.

Keith had been thinking about Lance, as per usual, and had been grinning like an idiot as he cleaned off the extra shaving cream from his face. He sobers now, caught. He doesn’t know what to say to Shiro. He always tells Shiro everything, but he doesn’t know how Lance might feel about him saying anything. Besides, they hadn’t really defined what they were to each other now. Were they together? Is that what saying ‘I like you’ means?

Keith decides on a partial truth. “Just happy to be back.” He slides the can of shaving cream over for Shiro to use. Where Coran had come across items like shaving cream and toothpaste in space was a mystery to him.

Shiro looks at him a moment longer before he lets it go, picking up his own razor. “We missed you. We’re happy you’re back too.”

Keith smiles at him and claps him on the shoulder as he leaves the bathroom.

Now that he’s dressed and ready, he can’t really prolong going to meet Allura and whoever else is already ready. He swings by the kitchen to grab something to eat before finding his way to the lounge. They tend to use this room because it’s the only one that has a table in it besides the kitchen, and the seating is more comfortable than kitchen chairs.

As the doors slide open, he enters to find Coran and Pidge clearing off some kind of board game from the table, a deck of cards and handful of dice balanced precariously close to the edge of it. Lance is holding one of the dice, looking at it closely.

“Why is this many sides even necessary?” Lance questions suspiciously, rolling the die in his hand before Coran takes it from him.

“You said you didn’t want to play. Maybe next time you’ll join us and find out.” Pidge pushes her glasses back up onto her nose and follows behind Coran with some kind of book. No one has noticed Keith’s entrance yet, and he finds comfort in the familiarity of the team’s needless good-natured bickering.

“I don’t want to play your nerd games. It involves a book, how fun can it be?” Lance demands lightly, falling into a chair at the newly cleared table. Keith walks over to join him, pulling a chair out across from him so they can face each other.

Lance seems to notice him then, startling before relaxing. He looks Keith over briefly before meeting his eyes. He smiles at Keith then, those white teeth on display, and kicks Keith’s ankle lightly under the table. Keith kicks him back, the corner of his mouth pulling up. It’s childish for sure, but Keith is glad it’s not awkward now that they’ve kissed. The reminder heats Keith’s face, and it must be noticeable because Lance’s grin widens. He can feel his ears twitching and he does his best to control them.

“Hey, thing one and thing two, a little help if you’re done playing footsie?” Their gaze is drawn to Pidge, who is carrying a cup of something steaming and an armful of tablets. The tablets are escaping her grip, sliding down her body until she’s preventing them from hitting the floor by an elbow. Lance gets up to take them from her, depositing them on the table before returning to his seat. They both ignore the footsie comment.

Keith takes a tablet from the stack and taps his finger on it, the screen lighting up as it turns on. He’s trying to figure out if he can change the wallpaper on it when the rest of the team shows up. Hunk, Allura, and Shiro join them at the table. Coran takes a seat a moment later. Finally, they’re all seated in a circle around the lounge table.

It only takes a beat before Allura gets right into it. “Keith, we are glad you have returned. I’m sure we would all love to know what happened after you were kidnapped?”

Keith shrugs. “I got kidnapped by the Galra from Avira. They held me hostage and most of the time they just left me alone,” he pauses, “but on one of the days they took me into a room for scientific testing. For some reason, Rhaegar is still working with the Galra.”

A silence greets him as the Paladins absorb the words ‘scientific testing’. Allura tilts her head at him. “I am assuming this testing resulted in your current state of being?” It’s asked with no small amount of distaste, and Keith resists the urge to snap back at her.

Keith nods. “They injected me with raw quintessence. Rhaegar said they wanted to see what it would do. He said they hadn’t expected me to become Galra. That it was in me all along.”

“You’re not Galra though,” Hunk chimes in, “You’re human.”

Keith leans back in his chair. “I must not be. At least not fully. I don’t think just injecting someone with quintessence would make them into a Galra.” Keith knows he’s right. He doesn’t know who his mom is, and his dad never talked about her much. Stranger things have happened.

“You cannot be Galra.” Allura says, echoing herself from the day before. Keith isn’t sure if she’s pointing out an error in his thinking or if she just doesn’t want him to be Galra. Either way, he’s purple.

It’s Shiro who cuts in this time. “I think we may need to approach the possibility that he is. Keith is right, it’s not like he just transformed from quintessence. The genes were probably there all along.”

“I spent all of this time thinking I was human. It’s new to me too. I’m not exactly thrilled I’m not what I thought I was, but I think it’s better if we just roll with the punches. It’s not like this messes with the team or anything.” Keith points out. It’s not like he suddenly can’t fly his lion because his Galra traits are showing. Under the table, a foot knocks into his again. His eyes flick to Lance, who gives him a nod in support.

Allura does not want to agree, Keith can tell. She’s leaning forward over the table, arms crossed in a defensive pose. Keith looks to Shiro who gives him a slight shake of the head, telling him to give Allura a minute to collect her thoughts. It still seems unfair to Keith that this conversation is even being held. When had a conversation about his being kidnapped turned into a debate about his heritage? What does it matter? He’s still Keith.

Finally, Allura sighs and drops her arms. “I suppose you’re right. It does not affect your ability to fly your lion or be a member of Voltron.” It’s about as close to approval as Keith is going to get.

Keith moves on. “Rhaegar also said that the Galra have bigger plans.”

_There are bigger things than just you, you know._

That gets everyone’s attention. Pidge looks up from the tablet she’d been messing with, and Lance sits a little straighter in his chair.

“Bigger plans?” Shiro puzzles out loud over the words. They seem to be just as vague and confusing to him as they are to Keith.

“That’s all he said. The real question is why he would tell me that at all. They must be very big plans if he feels comfortable telling a paladin of Voltron that they exist.” It’s this truth that worries Keith the most. The Galra must be cooking up something horrible to be so flippant in clueing Keith into it.It’s quiet for a long moment before Lance asks the question they’re all wondering. “So what do we do now?”

Shiro scrubs a hand over his face as he thinks it over. Allura leans to the side to speak quietly to Coran for a moment before she turns back.

“We will need to do a surveillance mission on any Galra ships we think may be carrying quintessence.” Allura announces, tone even and authoritative. Shiro reluctantly nods his head in agreement.

Keith has been back on the ship for one day. The idea of a surveillance mission exhausts him, but he knows it’s what needs to be done. Who knows what the Galra will do with it if they go unchecked.

“Is that really a good idea? We just got Keith back. What if they want to capture him again now that they know about his heritage?” Hunk questions, the slight waver in his voice a hint to his worry.

“He knows the risks.” Allura dismisses the thought, waving a hand.

“Woah, okay,” Lance leans around Shiro to look at Allura directly, “that doesn’t mean we should just ignore how dangerous this is.” His tone is light, but there’s a serious undercurrent of protective instinct to it.

“No, we shouldn’t, but it’s not going to stop the mission either.” Allura raises her eyebrows, leaning forward as well.

“Just stop. I’m going on the mission, just like always.” Keith interrupts them before it escalates any further. Watching Lance disagree with Allura is a little strange, like the rain falling up instead of down. It warms him that Lance is trying to defend him, despite the fact that Keith can take care of himself.

That seems to settle the matter, the tension in the room easing the slightest bit as Lance lets out a breath.

“We’ll plan the mission like we always do. We’ll talk it out and come together as a team to figure out what we’re going to do,” Shiro takes over, “But first we need to find ships carrying quintessence. Pidge, do you think you can find a way to do that?”

Pidge grins at him. “I’ll figure it out, don’t worry.”

Shiro nods. “Alright then. We’ll have Pidge track down the coordinates of candidate Galra ships. In the meantime, everyone rest. We’ll have another team meeting when we’re ready.”

And that’s that. For now, it’s a waiting game.

Once the meeting is over, everyone makes their way out of the room. Coran leaves with Allura, discussing something about improving the ship’s shield system. Shiro and Pidge leave too, Pidge doing her best to explain to Shiro how mapping raw materials of the universe works and new technology she might have. Eventually, it’s just Keith and Lance left at the table.

Keith stands from his chair and stretches before going to sit on the lounge couch. He plops down, resting his head on the arm of the couch and stretching out on it. He finds the remote for the screen that acts as their tv and presses the buttons until it turns on. None of them ever understand what’s happening on intergalactic tv, but it’s still interesting to watch.

Keith only lays there for a minute before Lance is joining him. Keith bends his legs so Lance can sit on the other end of the couch. Keith watches the screen for a while, running over the events of the meeting in his mind. At the very least, they’re all on the same page about what needs to happen now. Hopefully a surveillance mission will help them gather more information about the Galra’s plans.

His thoughts are interrupted by Lance’s hand on his ankle. It’s a light touch, the tips of Lance’s fingers tracing over the skin he can reach. It’s unexpected, but it feels nice. Keith stretches his legs out so that they’re in Lance’s lap. It moves his ankle out of Lance’s reach but puts the rest of his legs in touching distance. There’s only the slightest pause as Lance meets his eyes, giving him a once over, before his hands move to Keith’s calves. Lance lightly massages him, mostly just tracing over the shape of his legs. They sit like that for two episodes of something dramatic on the screen, two aliens yelling at each other.

Keith turns his head so he’s looking at Lance. “Are we together now?” His brief talk with Shiro this morning resurfaces.

Lance looks from the screen to Keith. “We said we had feelings for each other. We kissed.” Lance smiles at him, like he thinks it’s cute Keith is asking him this question.

“Well I don’t know how it works.” Keith raises his hands up in mock defense, “I was just checking.”

Lance tilts his head, looking more closely at Keith. “You’ve never had a boyfriend? Or a girlfriend?”

Keith fights the blush he can feel rising to the surface. “No.”

Lance doesn’t push him to say more. It’s not like Keith would have more to say anyway. There was nothing _to_ say. This was all new to him. A comfortable silence settles again. More episodes go by. Keith is debating getting up for food when something occurs to him. He sits up on the couch so he’s facing Lance.

“What happened to the Avirans?” Amidst the chaos of being kidnapped, rescued, and kissed, Keith hadn’t had the time to think about the people he’d been trying to help save.

Lance turns to face him more fully, their knees touching. “The survivors were moved to Adrik. The Galra had attacked Avira first. By the time they made it to Adrik, Shiro, Hunk, and Pidge were ready. They’re safe now.”

“Were there many survivors?” Keith almost doesn’t want to know how many lives were lost. He recalls helping a mother into a cellar to get her out of laser fire. He hopes she’s safe now.

Lance lifts a hand to Keith’s face, thumb rubbing over his cheekbone. “We did the best we could, Keith.” So no, there aren’t many survivors. It was their job to protect them. Keith let his lion get kidnapped and they were down a paladin when he should have been helping.

“Hey,” Lance puts his other hand to Keith’s cheek, cupping his face, “I mean it. We did the best we could. Those who are alive now, are alive because we moved to help them.”

Keith is forced to meet Lance’s eyes, there’s no where else to look, and he sees earnest honesty there. Keith nods once and rests his forehead on Lance’s. “Okay.”

“Okay.” Lance repeats. He leans forward to kiss Keith, a quick press of lips, before he lets go of Keith’s face and sits back. His stomach growls and Lance laughs.

“Let’s get something to eat. I’m thinking food goo? Or perhaps food goo?” Lance lists their pretend options, pulling Keith from the couch by the hand.

Keith mostly just feels salty that he didn’t get the opportunity to kiss back, but figures there’s time for that later. Maybe earlier than later if he can swing it.

For now, he lets Lance lead him into the kitchen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is kind of a bridge chapter, so sorry if it was a little boring. The action will pick up again soon! Thank you so much for reading!


	10. Closet room

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So like...I know I said the action was going to pick up again. But not in this chapter. This chapter is just for fun, so I hope you enjoy!

The next two or three days are spent in relative peace. Pidge is still working on getting the coordinates of Galra ships containing quintessence, and so they have no choice but to wait. Keith is at least grateful for the opportunity to rest, though he spends much of that time wondering what the hell ‘bigger plans’ encompasses for the Galra.

The first full day on the ship has Keith being bombarded with stories from Hunk and Shiro about their adventures on Adrik as they get used to being together again. To Keith, Adrik sounds pretty similar to Avira, minus an evil queen. Shiro informs him that Adrik’s sand is blue and not green, and that they all had their own rooms. Keith doesn’t exactly regret having to share his with Lance.

Keith recounts how he got shot, since he conveniently managed to forget this tidbit in yesterday’s meeting, and the worried faces of his found family make him feel warm inside. He assures them he’s fine and shows them the scar. Lance, for his part, chirps in with “when he woke up, he just wanted pudding”. Hunk and Shiro laugh at that, and it has Keith’s lips quirking up. It’s a good day.

The second day is more taking care of business. Pidge’s convoluted search engine has narrowed their possible targets down to a handful, which means they need to start planning the mission. The first problem they run into is how they’re going to go about getting into the ship. Considering the last few times Keith was on a Galra ship, he doesn’t think they will just be able to fly into the hangar this time. They settle on using the Green Lion’s cloaking ability to descend on the roof of the ship and cutting a hole into it. Simple, but effective.

The second problem they run into is how they’re going to get everybody out again. Without many options available, Allura and Coran will stay with the castle and Pidge will provide support. It’s not a detailed plan, but it never goes according to plan anyway.

The team spends hours discussing logistics until they have a basic plan contrived. It’s as safe as a mission can be, and it’s pretty cut and dry. They’re going to get in, find what they need to know, and then get the hell out again. Easy peasy. Forty-five minutes into the meeting, Lance slides his foot up Keith’s calf. Keith jerks out of the slump he’d been in and meets a smirking Lance’s heavy gaze.

The second day is taking care of business, and also becoming increasingly frustrated with the lack of an opportunity to have a second alone with Lance. Don’t get him wrong, Keith is grateful to have the team safe and to swap stories and to have movie nights again. Incredibly grateful. He’s just also a guy who has finally gotten together with the guy he’s been crushing on and therefore feels a strong need to touch him. All the time. At any moment. It’s driving him crazy.

Which is why, on the third day, shit hits the fan.

* * *

Keith wakes up like normal. He gets ready for the day, brushes his teeth and gets dressed like normal. When he goes to get breakfast, Allura is frowning at a tablet in her hand as she leans forward onto the countertop. Next to her, Hunk is mixing something together in a bowl. Some of the mixture escapes over the side and Allura just scoots farther down. This scenario is pretty common and so Keith thinks nothing of it.

Keith takes his bowl and plops down at the kitchen table. He’s about halfway through his food when Coran enters the room covered in what looks like motor oil and something blue.

Allura looks up at his entrance. “I’m going to take it that you couldn’t get it to run again?”

Coran steals a kitchen towel from a drawer and wipes his hands. “I’m afraid not, princess. From what I could see all of the caps are busted, and that’s only the ones at eye level. They need to be replaced, and soon.”

“That’s no good,” Allura clicks her tongue, “The power will go out and we’ll have to rely on the generators. Even then we’ll still be operating at fifty percent capacity.”

At the somewhat ominous conversation happening around him, Keith interjects himself. “Is something broken?” Even Hunk stops cooking at that, looking between the two Alteans.

Both Allura and Coran turn to him. They give each other a look, and Keith regrets asking. Allura leans further over the counter toward him and Coran pulls a small metal object from his pocket and sets it on the table in front of Keith. It doesn’t look like anything but junk to him.

“Keith, how small of a space do you think you can get into?” Coran questions lightly, as if he’s just curious about Keith’s acrobatic skills.

_This isn’t going to be good._

It’s a few beats before Keith responds. “How small of a space are we talking?”

Twenty minutes after the metal is plunked down in front of Keith, he’s standing in a room of the castle he’s never been in before. It’s larger than the lounge but emptier, no furniture or storage items cluttering up the space. It smells a little musty, as if it hasn’t been opened in a decade or so.

Coran had sent Keith to his room to change into a pair of leggings that he usually trains in before leading him down a long corridor he didn’t know existed. Allura walks beside Coran, and Pidge walks with Keith. For whatever they’re about to do, apparently Pidge’s expertise is needed. Now, they all stand in the room staring into a round opening in the wall that’s maybe a tad wider than Keith’s shoulders. Suddenly, it all makes sense.

Keith breaks the silence. “You…want me to get in that.” It’s not a question. Keith takes a few steps closer to it so he can look inside. He sees nothing but blackness.

Coran moves to stand beside him and claps a hand on his shoulder. “I’m afraid so. You see, there are certain mechanical parts of the castle that do need to be replaced every so often despite the power of the Balmeran crystals.”

“Mechanical parts?” He asks, for lack of a better question. At this point he’s just prolonging the inevitable.

“Indeed, the metal I showed you belongs to a complex mechanical plot containing numerous valves that have these covers that allow—” A hand covers Coran’s mouth. Keith gives Pidge a nod of thanks at being saved from a lecture about engineering he won’t understand.

Pidge gives it to him straight. “We need you to go take all these metal bits off the valves. If they don’t get replaced, the castle power shuts down and we have to use the emergency generators, so it’s kind of urgent.”

Keith tries a second time to see anything but deep dark blackness in the tube. “They’re just in there somewhere?”

Allura, irritated at their lack of urgency, cuts in. “If you follow the tunnel you will end up in a small room containing these valves. We need you to go in because the room is very small and narrow, and we think you are the correct size to be able to unscrew the metal caps. Pidge will stay here and monitor the system functioning.”

“The only caveat is that there is an automatic sliding door to the room that’s meant to maintain a gas leak. While there will be no gas leak, the fact that the power could go out while you are inside the room means you could be trapped in there for a while until we can override the system from the outside.” Coran mentions casually, adjusting a handheld monitor for Pidge.

Everyone turns to him, as if he has a choice in the matter and they’re waiting on his approval. He sighs. “Well, in I go I guess.”

* * *

This turns out to be a stupid fucking idea. Keith is tall now. He’s got to be almost six feet, and while he is agile, his limbs make this very difficult. The tube he’s crawling into is barely big enough for him, and Keith wonders why the fuck the ship was built that accessing these controls is so difficult.

He grumbles to himself the entire time he’s crawling into the darkness, a light in one hand. It sends flashes of light bouncing around the tube every time he moves forward and it gives him a headache almost immediately. Eventually, he makes it to the small room with the caps.

Calling this space a room is pushing it. ‘Closet’ is the label Keith would use. There’s just enough space for him and maybe a little extra to stand. He swings his legs down over the edge of the crawl space and lowers himself into the closet. The door seals behind him. He has a quick thought about oxygen but forgets it. He just needs to get this over with. Lining the walls is a hundred or more valves. He suddenly understands the bag Coran had shoved at him as he was hoisting himself into the tube.

_This sucks._

Keith has unscrewed a small pile of the caps when he hears a voice coming from the crawl space.

“Keith! Jesus, does this ever end.” Lance’s voice echoes off of the metal walls as he makes his way towards Keith and the closet.

A minute later, the door slides open with a whoosh from the pressure release, and then Lance’s shoes come into view as he jumps down. The door slides closed again. This room is not meant to hold two people. This means that as Lance gets his bearings, he is forced into Keith’s personal space. The space isn’t wide enough for the two of them to stand side by side, so they are forced front to front. All of Keith’s frustration from lack of alone time comes rushing back at him the second Lance’s chest bumps into his.

Lance doesn’t seem to notice their proximity as he explains his sudden appearance. “Allura and Coran were worried about the power going off before you finish. They sent me to come help you untwist the caps.” Lance is a little out of breath from the effort of crawling and arranging himself, and every breath is hot on Keith’s neck.

“Did they.” It’s all Keith can come up with at the moment. He shuffles around to try and give himself some space but it’s no use. No matter what he does some part of him rubs against Lance, which is what he wants, but not necessarily like this.

_The universe hates me. The universe is playing a joke on me right now._

Lance finally understands the situation that they’re in and goes a little pink in the cheeks. “Yeah. Although there’s not much room in here is there.” The sentence gets a little breathy by the end and Keith doesn’t know if it’s claustrophobia or lack of oxygen in the closet or what.

From Keith’s perspective, Allura and Coran’s dumbass plan has backfired. How is Lance supposed to help him when there is barely any room to bend to untwist the caps? How is Keith supposed to care about untwisting the caps when the slightest movement brings his lips closer to Lance’s?

“Let’s just…maybe if we’re back to back we can each unscrew the ones in sight.” Keith gets out, trying to find a place to put his hands and settles on Lance’s hips. He swears Lance leans into it, but he twists to face the opposite direction before he can know for sure.

They get to work, a little desperate to get out of the pint size room.

Keith loses track of time while he works. He’s sweating pretty good, the small room with too many bodies means a certain level of humidity. Not to mention he has to work at not noticing every little elbow or knee or shoulder Lance bumps into him with. He is hot for Lance at the best of times, and now isn’t any different. He just does his best to unscrew the fucking caps and put them in the bag.

They don’t get very far into it when the light in the room dims and then goes out completely. The whir of the mechanics in the ship goes eerily silent. They stand quietly in the dark for a few beats, listening to each other breathing, before a yell is heard through the tube.

“That was the power, sorry guys! We’re working on getting a generator hooked up to the controls for that room! Oxygen funnels in from other parts of the ship so don’t worry! Hang in there!” Coran shouts, voice carrying.

So here Keith is. Locked with Lance in a tiny room in the dark, all sweaty. When he prayed for this, he didn’t know he was going to have to specify the time and location.

Lance twists back around to face Keith, and Keith rotates as well. He can see Lance pretty well in the dark, and he thinks this must be his Galran genetics. Lance obviously can’t see him though, and Keith watches him flounder a place for his hands before they find Keith’s ribs. Lance slides his hands down until they’re on Keith’s waist.

“So this is, uh…cozy.” Keith doesn’t know if he should speak or not. It feels wrong to in the dark and quiet, but it’s so painfully silent and he can hear Lance’s heart beat picking up.

Lance snorts a laugh and takes a step closer to Keith so that his lips touch Keith’s jaw. “I don’t know if cozy is the word I’d use.”

Keith’s back is pretty much against the wall, the valves digging into his spine. He ignores it completely with the way Lance’s lips brush his skin as he speaks. Keith tilts his head in question even though Lance can’t see it. “Then what word what you use?”

Lance doesn’t answer him. Instead, he places proper kisses to Keith’s jaw and moves down to his neck. Keith jolts in surprise at the action even though he should have been expecting it. The touch burns through him and he wonders if it always feels like this or if it’s just Lance. Keith moves his hands to the small of Lance’s back and smoothes over his spine.

Keith is already breathing too hard for what little they’ve done. He'll blame it on the amount of time he's spent trapped in here with Lance so close without touching. He is comforted slightly to find Lance in a similar state when he pauses in his ministrations. Lance looks up at him then, squinting in the dark to try and see his face. Keith takes the opportunity to get the kiss he’s been not so patiently waiting for.

He ducks his head and makes use of his Galra vision and presses his lips to Lance’s. It feels just as good as the other times they’ve done this, if not better for the way they’re pressed together now. The kiss picks up in intensity as Lance tilts his head and touches his tongue to Keith’s lip. Keith gasps at the sensation and Lance takes the opportunity to touch his tongue to Keith’s. From there, there’s nothing sweet or tentative.

Lance reaches both hands up and wraps them around Keith’s neck to angle his head to his liking and takes a step so that the last remaining space between them disappears. This brings Lance’s hips into contact with Keith’s and he goes almost lightheaded at the knowledge that Lance is hard right now.

“Fuck.” Keith lets out a small sound and is embarrassed for the way he is so easily overwhelmed.

Lance just rolls his hips in response to Keith’s noise, a low moan falling from his own mouth. Keith pauses the kiss at the sound of it, so turned on by the sound of Lance’s pleasure that it’s almost painful and rests his head on Lance’s shoulder for a moment. He presses kisses to Lance’s neck while he gets himself under control.

Lance takes the opportunity to speak, and that does nothing for Keith’s predicament. “You’re so hot, I didn’t know it was going to be like this.” Lance breathes, tilting his head to give Keith better access.

“Like what?” Keith mumbles between kisses, grip hard on Lance’s hips.

Lance shudders. “Intense,” he huffs a laugh, “I should have known, you’re good at everything.” The end of Lance’s sentence gets cut off as Keith kisses him again to quiet him. There’s only so much Keith can take of Lance’s voice sounding like that.

The light in the room blinks once before coming to life again. Various lights on the control panels in the room spark as the ship regains power. The light in the room pulls them apart and Keith can’t do anything for a moment but stare at how swollen Lance’s lips are and the flush covering his cheeks.

They take a step apart as they find some calm, Lance straightening out his shirt and Keith runs a hand through his hair. Lance gives Keith a once over and Keith laments the loss of his touch. Eventually, they calm themselves down enough to return to the task.

Lance clears his throat. “So, I bet I can get my half untwisted faster than you can yours.” He throws Keith a smirk, wiggling his eyebrows.

Keith rolls his eyes good naturedly. “You’re on.”

* * *

Half an hour later, they finally emerge from the tube. Keith takes in the fresh cool air and sets the bag of old caps down at Allura’s feet. Keith has sweat fully through his shirt, and Lance doesn’t look much better. He’s glad he can blame the closet room on that.

“Well done, boys!” Allura rummages in the bag, inspecting the caps.

“You guys look so gross.” Pidge comments from her spot in front of the monitor, green smoothie in hand.

Lance points at her. “Where did you get that? I want one.” Lance sits down on the ground and leans against the wall, stretching his limbs out.

Keith joins Lance against the wall, just far enough that they’re not touching. He doesn’t know if he can handle that right now, with the memory of the closet room so fresh in his mind.

Pidge takes a sip of her drink. “Hunk made them. You’ll have to ask him. I would shower first if I were you, you guys are rank.” Allura just nods.

They sit there for a few more minutes as they muster the energy to get up to shower. Finally, with some polite prompting from Allura, they do. They leave the others behind in the room to finish up, and they make their way to the showers. They spend most of the walk in silence, and Keith is reminded of his first night back on the ship when they kissed for the first time.

“That was pretty amazing.” Keith bites his lips, remembering how Lance had sounded as he touched him.

Lance glances at him as they walk, turning his head to give Keith a grin. “We should do it again sometime.”

Keith turns to him. “Can we?” he asks, excited at the prospect of being allowed to touch Lance like that again.

“Yes,” Lance laughs, “With any luck, many times. I fully intend to.” Lance’s gaze is heavy as he says it, promise underlying the words.

Keith shivers and nods his agreement. The rest of the walk goes quickly. They separate at the end of the hall to grab a new set of clothes and their shower things. Lance pecks him on the cheek when they part and smacks Keith on the ass. Keith turns around to deck him on the arm but Lance has already quickly made it out of his reach, snickering as he goes.

* * *

Later that night after dinner, Coran catches Keith in the lounge.

“Keith, a moment of your time please.” Coran is holding another bag. He looks guilty, and Keith spends a few moments trying to piece together what he might have done.

Keith pauses the tv program. “Yeah, what’s up?” Keith is in his pajamas, feet up on the couch. He’s comfortable. Pidge, Hunk, and Shiro are playing the board game with the dice and book at the table. They tried to explain the rules to Keith, but he gave up on the third attempt.

“So, you and Lance did a great job of unscrewing the caps,” Coran begins, “but…you need to screw these new ones on.”

At the table, Pidge just cackles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Keith finally got his kiss lol, sorry if it's awkward I'm not the best at writing those kinds of scenes

**Author's Note:**

> So I originally posted this story to fan fiction.net but then I didn't like how it was going and so this is me, writing it over again and posting it to AO3. I promise I'm still work on To Strive, but I just couldn't quit thinking about this fic. Also, this takes place somewhere after Lance and the mermaids. This is just the first chapter to a slow burn. If you would like to see the rest of the story or enjoyed the chapter, please leave me a Kudos!


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